NYT gift: U.S. Has New Intelligence About Russia’s Nuclear Capabilities
We clearly need to develop the technology shown in the James Bond film You Only Live Twice (1967)...A current and a former U.S. official said the new intelligence was related to Russia’s attempts to develop a space-based antisatellite nuclear weapon. ABC News reported earlier that the intelligence had to do with such a capability. Current and former officials said the nuclear weapon was not in orbit.
Russian pilot who defected to Ukraine ‘murdered in Spain’
Body of Maksim Kuzminov, who landed an armoured chopper in Kharkhiv in August, was reportedly found with half a dozen gunshot wounds
James Crisp, EUROPE EDITOR
19 February 2024 • 9:54pm
A Russian pilot who deserted by flying his helicopter to Ukraine has been found dead in Spain, Kyiv has said after reports the defector was murdered.
Maksim Kuzminov’s body was reportedly found with half a dozen gunshot wounds outside a garage in the town of Villajoyosa, in Alicante, which is home to a large Russian and Ukrainian community.
He made international headlines after landing the armoured chopper at a military airfield in Kharkhiv last August. He had been promised £400,000 to defect, which was a reward designed to encourage further humiliating defections.
The 28-year-old flew his Mi-8 helicopter, worth £15 million, to Ukraine in a joint operation with Kyiv’s intelligence services dubbed Synytsia, which led to him being branded a traitor in Russia.
Vladimir Putin’s GRU military intelligence agents had orders to eliminate the pilot and his execution was “only a matter of time”, Russian media reported several months ago.
Spain’s EFE news agency said sources close to the investigation confirmed the man who was killed was Mr Kuzminov.
EFE reported Mr Kuzminov was shot on the ramp to the underground parking lot of his building in what was seen as a settling of scores. Eyewitnesses are understood to have seen the same car which was later found burnt out fleeing the scene.
The sources said it was Mr Kuzminov who was slain, even though documents on his body said he was a 33-year-old Ukrainian.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/ ... d-in-spain
Urch, the Telegraph seems to have cut back on its editing staff.to have seen the same car which was later found burnt out fleeing the scene.
The new sanctions include measures created by the Treasury Department, the State Department and the Commerce Department, and they target more than 500 individuals and entities that have been associated with Russia’s aggression toward Ukraine.
The Biden administration is also imposing sanctions on three Russian government officials who were connected to Mr. Navalny’s death.
“Russia’s economy and military-industrial base are showing clear signs of weakness in part due to the actions we, along with our partners and allies around the world, have taken to support Ukraine’s brave defense,” Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen said in a statement. “Putin has mortgaged the present and future of the Russian people for his own aims to subjugate Ukraine.”
Over the last two years, the United States has worked with allies from the Group of 7 nations to cap the price at which Russian oil can be sold on global markets, frozen hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian central bank assets, and enacted trade restrictions to try to block the flow of technology and equipment that Russia uses to supply its military.
The measures announced on Friday attempt to go further, focusing on key cogs in Russia’s financial system, digging deeper into its military supply chain and going after enablers in other countries like China and the United Arab Emirates.
The sanctions target two of Russia’s largest companies by revenue, SUEK and Mechel. SUEK’s transportation and logistics operation serves the Russian military, and Mechel is a major producer of specialty steels. The measures also target Russia’s financial sector, with sanctions on the National Payment Card System joint stock company, which operates the Russian national payment system.
In trying to slow Russia’s war effort, the Biden administration went beyond just its major defense companies. The sanctions imposed on Friday also go after manufacturers of lubricants, robotics, ball bearings and batteries used by the Russian military.
The United States was not alone in ratcheting up the economic pressure on Russia this week. The European Union unveiled its 13th tranche of sanctions on Russia, banning nearly 200 people and entities that have been helping Russia procure weapons from traveling or doing business within the bloc. Britain also announced sanctions on companies linked to Russia’s ammunition supply chain, as well as on six Russians accused of running the Arctic prison where Mr. Navalny died.
Despite the breadth of the sanctions that Western allies have imposed on Russia, its economy has proved to be resilient. China, India and Brazil have been buying Russian oil in record quantities, and spending on the war effort has stimulated the Russian economy, which the International Monetary Fund said last month was growing faster than expected.
It is unclear whether the sanctions that were announced on Friday will make a significant difference in the trajectory of the war.
Illia Ponomarenko
@IAPonomarenko
Two years.
It's been two years since that fucking night of February 24.
We knew -- well, we've been told "it's not 100% confirmed yet...but THIS is possibly due at 4 am or 5 am, stay put."
A half-glass of single malt whisky with ice poured into a glass, the final hours alone in sweet silence in front of a laptop.
Scrolling through the news all the time.
And then the morbid face of Putin twisted with sick rage live on TV. And, shortly after, the rolling thunder of missile strikes coming in from all around Kyiv.
That was supposed to be the apocalypse of a nation, but, thanks to so many men and women standing up, that night became the beginning of Ukraine's finest hour.
The one that old grandpa Winston was once talking about.
Oh, it's been an epoch of time ever since that day.
The Battle of Kyiv. The heroic resistance of Sumy, Chernihiv, and Kharkiv. A lone Ukrainian Marine sacrificing his life to blow up a bridge and stop advancing Russian tanks.
The tragic debacle in the south. The Russian extermination of Mariupol. The Bucha massacre. The unspeakable meat grinder in Donbas. The Kharkiv operation. The cheering crowds jubilating from the Ukrainian colors getting back to Kherson.
The fields of death and gore at Bakhmut and Avdiivka. Battles in the sea and the air.
So many ups and downs, so many heroes, human-made miracles. The price of survival as a nation is terrible. We're going to mourn and shed tears many decades in the future over what Russia has done.
We've seen unbelievable things in this war. Ukraine has done and is doing incredible things in this war in spite of all odds.
The Ukrainian military has been making a gargantuan sacrifice against one of the largest and the most brutal war machines in human history.
Everyone in this war has revealed their true face, from very ordinary people to the highest-ranking power brokers.
Frankly, I don't get it how some could choose to side with the evil, bloodlust, blatant lies, hypocrisy, and imperial savagery over the story of a nation that was supposed to go extinct within weeks but now enters the third year of resistance against the most terrible war of extermination since Adolf Hitler.
With everything that has happened over the last few months, we all should be ready for a lot of hard things to happen. A lot of hopes have been broken due to things we have no control over.
Yet, we need to keep doing what we should and what is simply right.
We've made an extremely long way, and the struggle continues no matter what.
The Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra was formed in 2022 by its founder and music director, Keri-Lynn Wilson, in coordination with the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture, the New York Metropolitan Opera and the Polish National Opera in Warsaw. It was a direct response to Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine and a bold initiative to defend Ukraine’s cultural legacy as the country fights for its freedom in the face of violence and aggression. “On the day Putin invaded I was angry and appalled and immediately determined to do something to oppose this barbarism”, says Wilson. “Not just because I am of Ukrainian-Canadian heritage, or because I have cousins who live in the country, some of whom have fought on the front line in Donbas. But because this assault on a nation and its culture demanded a response in kind. I could not take up arms, but I could take up my baton as my weapon.” The orchestra is under the patronage of Ukraine’s First Lady, Olena Zelenska, who describes it as “the musical voice of Ukraine”, adding that its performances proclaim “the timeless message of liberty contained in the eternal classics of their program. Music will speak to silence aggression,”
The highlight of the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra’s 2023 European tour was its emotionally charged performances of Beethoven’s Symphony No 9, with Schiller’s great poem “Ode to Joy”, his cry of freedom, resistance and progress against the forces of oppression, memorably sung by the soloists and chorus in Ukrainian.
Russian missile strike hits near Zelensky motorcade in Odessa
By Isabelle Khurshudyan
March 6, 2024 at 10:16 a.m. EST
KYIV — A Russian missile strike appeared to target Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday, landing near his motorcade in the Black Sea port city of Odessa, where the president was meeting with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
Zelensky and members of the Greek delegation were not harmed, despite the missile landing some 500 feet away, Greek officials told the Protothema news outlet. The Ukrainian presidential office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Zelensky and Mitsotakis were visiting the Odessa port around 10:40 a.m. when air-raid sirens could be heard. The explosion then occurred within minutes.
“We witnessed the strike today,” Zelensky told reporters after. “You see who we're dealing with; they don't care where to hit. I know there were casualties today; I don't know all the details yet, but I know there are casualties.”
“Whether they are military, civilians, international guests — it doesn't matter to these people,” Zelensky added. “Either they've lost their minds or they have no control over their terrorist army's actions. This emphasizes the need for us to defend ourselves, and the best way is through an air defense system.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... ke-odessa/
Yeah, killing the Greek PM is a boneheaded move.
‘He had no idea he was being sent to a war zone’: the Indian and Nepali men on frontlines in Ukraine
Signing up for jobs in Russia, Germany or Dubai, young men have been ‘made to join the Russian military’, their families say
Hannah Ellis-Petersen and Aakash Hassan in Delhi and Gaurav Pokharel in Kathmandu
Thu 7 Mar 2024 06.00 CET
When Hemil Mangukiya left his small village in the Indian state of Gujarat last December, he told his family he was off to Russia to make a better living than was possible at home in India.
Lured by a recruitment video he had seen on YouTube, the 23-year-old had thought he was going for a secure security job far from the war in Ukraine. But in strained phone calls home from Russia, he told his family he was instead sent to a month-long military training camp and then taken to the frontlines, where he was made to dig trenches, carry ammunition and operate rifles and machine guns. Then, in late February, his calls abruptly stopped.
The call that came days later shattered his father’s heart: Mangukiya had died in a missile strike somewhere in Ukraine.
“I think he hid from us the danger he was in,” said Ashwin Mangukiya, 52. “Our entire family is devastated by this. We are still trying to get back his dead body.”
Mangukiya’s death has shed light on the fate of dozens – by some estimates, hundreds – of Indians who have ended up on the frontlines of the Russia-Ukraine war against their will, after signing up for roles described as military helpers or security guards. In some cases, families say the men thought they were flying out for jobs in Dubai but then were sent on to Russia by agents.
This week, a video circulated on social media of seven Indians from Punjab who claimed they had travelled to Russia as tourists for New Year but had been taken by an agent to Belarus and detained. “The police handed us over to Russian authorities, who made us sign documents,” said one of the men in the video, identified as Gagandeep Singh. “Now they are forcing us to fight in the war against Ukraine.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... in-ukraine
x4Well, Shanghai is a city in China. The meaning you are looking for is a slang term
The nearest Russian Port to Shanghai would be Vladivostok, I think? So 'Vladivostocked' (adding the c to make the syllable scan and sound correctly). Although given the pun that would be involved, I think 'Vladdied' is a good, shorter substitute. YMMV.
Murmansked would fit. As would, I suppose, "Crimeaed" or "Odessaed", because of the front-line-in-Ukraine connotation.
The US transferred thousands of machine guns, sniper rifles, rocket launchers and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition seized from Iran to Ukraine last week, US Central Command announced on Tuesday.
Ukraine has been suffering from shortages of weapons and munitions on the battlefield in its war against Russia, with the US unable to send more equipment from its own stockpiles until more funding is approved by Congress.
CENTCOM said the materiel transferred to Ukraine is enough to equip one Ukrainian brigade — around 4,000 personnel — with small-arms rifles. “These weapons will help Ukraine defend against Russia’s invasion,” CENTCOM said in a statement.
The munitions were originally seized by the US military and its partners “from four separate transiting stateless vessels between 22 May 2021 to 15 Feb 2023,” but the US government did not obtain ownership of the equipment via the Justice Department’s civil forfeiture process until December of last year, CENTCOM said.
It is not the first time the US has transferred seized Iranian military equipment to the Ukrainians. The US transferred over one million rounds of seized Iranian ammunition to the Ukrainian armed forces in October, CNN previously reported.
Over the past year, the US Navy has seized thousands of Iranian assault rifles and more than one million rounds of ammunition from vessels used by Iran to ship weapons to the Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. The seizures, frequently carried out with regional partner forces, target small stateless vessels on routes historically used to smuggle weapons to the Houthis.
)The Biden administration last month secretly shipped long-range missiles to Ukraine for the first time in the two-year war — and Kyiv has already used the weapon twice to strike deep behind Russian lines.
In March, the U.S. quietly approved the transfer of a number of Army Tactical Missile Systems with a range of nearly 200 miles, said a senior Biden administration official and two U.S. officials, allowing President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s forces to put at risk more Russian targets inside Ukrainian sovereign territory.
The administration will include additional long-range ATACMS in a new $1 billion package of military aid President Joe Biden approved on Wednesday, one of the U.S. officials said.
