In today's #vatniksoup, I'll introduce a Portuguese Major General and TV commentator, Agostinho Costa. He's best-known for his terrible, pro-Kremlin analysis on the Russo-Ukrainian War on @cnnportugal.
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Costa joined the Military Academy in 1977 and finished his training in 1982. His work history in the Portuguese Army is remarkable, and before retiring in 2021, he worked as a EUROFOR Chief of Staff, head of the GNR, and as vice president of Eurodefense Portugal.
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Like so many generals after retiring, he became an analyst and was invited by CNN Portugal to comment on the Russo-Ukrainian War. But his analysis had two big problems: he was 1) biased towards Russia, and 2) almost always wrong in his predictions.
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At the beginning of the war when the +60 km convoy was forming up and ran into logistical problems,Costa was making sure to not show the Russian army as incompetent.Even when the soldiers were exchanging food for gas,he outright refused to admit that Russia had a big problem.4/22
Costa was also certain that the main objective of the Ruskies was to take Kyiv, actually saying that "the Russians are already in Kiev, right?", only to later change his mind, saying that it actually was NOT in the objectives.
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He was also against sending military aid to the Ukrainian Army, and he thought that for example sending missile systems to Ukraine is pointless as "they don't know how to use them." Costa referred to the attack on the Kerch bridge as a "subversive terrorist attack", ...
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...and when the interviewer compared the event to the Russian shelling of Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant to get it off the grid, Costa considered that Russia's actions were not terrorism. After Russia bombed the port of Odessa one day after the grain deal, Costa came to...
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...the rescue, saying that "Russians have not pledged not to attack ports and other infrastructure." He's often referred to the Russians as being gentle, saying that they're going easy to not hurt the civilian population. This bold claim seemed especially unbelievable...
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...after Russia killed 60 civilians with a missile strike to Kramatorsk railway station in Apr, 2022. In Feb 2023, he repeated the sentiment, stating that "We have already seen that Putin is not willing to accept many dead in this war."
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Missiles aren't the only military aid senhor Costa has criticized. He's also stated that the F-16's - that will be sent eventually - will make no difference, and nor do the Leopards that have been sent because of the "low numbers".
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He's criticized Portugal for sending 4 out of their 37 tanks to Ukraine,because Portugal is apparently under constant thread from its imperialistic neighbor, Spain. In the end of Jan 2023, Agostinho declared that "there is no doubt that Ukraine is about to lose this war",..
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...and that the Ukrainian Army is "about to collapse in terms of personnel, equipment, arms and ammo".
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Costa compared the assassination of blogger Vladlen Tatarsky in St. Petersburg to the tactics employed by the Daesh terrorists.
See Tatarsky's history in the video below.
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In Apr 2023, Costa declared that "Crimea will not move to Ukraine without a global confrontation using nuclear weapons." In May 2023, he spread the false narrative that 200 NATO officers were killed in a missile strike, but added 100 casualties just to keep it original.
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Finally, let's talk about Costa's favorite topic, which is the fall of Bakhmut. On 3 Dec 2022, he claimed that Bakhmut is "at risk of falling" to the Russians. The next day, he said that it would be captured by the end of the year. In Dec 2023, he said that the objective..
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...wasn't actually to capture Bakhmut, but to destroy the Ukrainian forces. On 7 Mar 2023, according to Agostinho, Ukrainian command had already abandoned the city. On 8 Apr 2023, he said that Ukraine will retreat "in a matter of days".
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Finally, on 20 May 2023 and after five months, he gets to be right - Bakhmut has fallen and senhor Costa can open the champagne.
General Agostinho is member of the Freemasons, and he's caused so much discomfort among his fellow masons that some of them have announced...
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...their views on him publicly. Generally, you should never talk about the organization or about its members in public, but I guess even the Portuguese Freemasons, unlike Putin, have their red lines that shouldn't be crossed.
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Costa and two other generals were accused of "pro-Russian positions" already at the beginning of the invasion. A former military officer said that all three had "a certain admiration for the doctrine and professionalism of the Russians," and fascination towards...
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...General Gerasimov and his doctrine of hybrid warfare. The two other generals saw the writing on the wall and sort of faded out from the spotlight, but Costa is still going strong.
Now, I feel like there's nothing wrong in inspiring to be a neutral military analyst.
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But, Agostinho Costa is nothing of the sort. He's a Portuguese version of Douglas Macgregor, never condemning the Russian Army and usually blaming and underestimating the Ukrainians. I'm sure that he garners a lot of attention and views, but as long as he's sharing his...
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..."wisdom" on this war, the credibility of @cnnportugal as a serious news outlet deteriorates, as it did with Bruno Carvalho:
Thank you for the sous-chef @Cbritinha and the rest of the Portuguese team for helping me to prepare this Caldo Verde.
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