Michael MacKay Profile picture
Mar 2 5 tweets 1 min read
For 8 years since #RussiaInvadedUkraine most "experts" studied American and German intelligence reports about Russian capabilities. These assessment were hopelessly wrong.

I've been reading accurate Ukrainian intel. I expected the Russian army to be the piece of crap it is.
The Ukrainians are far better at human intelligence than the Americans and Germans are when it comes to the Russian regime of state terrorism.

They knew all about corruption in the Russian officer corps. Theft of matériel is so massive little of it makes it to front-line units.
I would laugh out loud each time mainstream news media in the U.S. put out a "breaking" story about something the Pentagon said, which turned out to be something the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Armed Forces of Ukraine had said several years earlier.
Not paying attention to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in Crimea and Donbas has consequences. Other Western democracies were unprepared for the Russian offensive when it came. The Western democracy of Ukraine was fully prepared.
Not knowing how bad the Russian army is can't be blamed solely as an "intelligence failure." Big bureaucracies have filters for what information reaches decision-makers. But those top people made statements that were always off-the-mark, showing accurate intel never reached them.

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More from @mhmck

Mar 3
Partly because Western leaders refused air cover for Ukrainian defenders, Russian troops have advanced to the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. It is the largest in Europe.

The Russians are now shelling Zaporizhia NPP with artillery.
Livecast of the fire at the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, under Russian artillery fire tonight:
Flashes from Russian artillery strikes at Zaporizhia nuclear power plant a minute ago. Smoke is rising in the lower right of this screen capture. Image
Read 6 tweets
Mar 3
Because of losses suffered while advancing into Ukraine, Russian troops have begun to act more insidiously. They fire from within residential areas at civilians.

As Putin promised at the start of the war in March 2014: "We will come at you behind your women and children." 1/4
Russia mobilized 117 battalion tactical groups for the offensive against Ukraine. On Day 8 the enemy has deployed all but six of them to the territory of Ukraine. Morale of Russian units is low. 2/4 Image
Russia delayed a landing in the Odesa – Zatoka area, instead carrying out demonstrations to distract Ukrainian defenders.

The Russian invaders have fired so many Kalibr missiles they've run out. Currently the enemy is replenishing supplies. 3/4 Image
Read 4 tweets
Mar 2
Amazing news. Ukraine's 95th Brigade entered the city of Horlivka in Donetsk region and is fighting Russian occupation forces there. Horlivka was taken by the Russian invaders in the first year of the war, 2014-15.

Liberating Horlivka would give a big morale boost to Ukrainians.
Horlivka is a vulnerable position of Russian invasion/occupation forces in Donbas. Able to launch their attack from the north and the west, Ukrainian forces can envelop the city and cut it off from Debaltseve to the east and Donetsk to the south. Image
Prisoners of war captured by Ukrainian forces in the first hours of the raid were conscripts – local people with no military training who were forced into the fake "DPR" only in the last few weeks.
Read 4 tweets
Mar 2
The fear Americans have of nuclear war is skillfully amplified by Russian psychological warfare. This active measure by the Putin regime is so powerful it takes away the greatest asset the United States has – its military superiority – while Russia invades Ukraine.
There's another benefit to the Russians from their attack on the psyche of Americans. Because they expect to see a great, nuclear-armed power – the "former Soviet Union" – Americans could not see the clapped-out remnant of an empire the Russian Federation had actually become.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2014 didn't register with most Americans. It didn't fit with the prejudice that had been fostered in them about Russia.

Russia was revealed to be a regime of state terrorism when it shot down MH17 in 2014. But most people ignored the facts.
Read 4 tweets
Mar 1
To those who say we should not unite with Ukrainians to defeat the Russian invasion of Europe: where do you draw the line?

If it's not at the Dnipro River is it at the Vistula? the Oder? the Rhine? the Seine?

If it's not 10 thousand dead Europeans is it 100 thousand? a million?
I argued for years that we should help Ukrainians defeat Russia on the Siverskyi Donets River/Kalmius River line in Donbas. But it's too late for that now.
That Ukraine remains, to this day, the only fighting defender of Western civilization against the Russian barbarians is astonishing.
Read 5 tweets
Feb 28
Hungary refuses to allow weapons to transit its territory to go to Ukraine. The Orbán regime, a proxy for the Putin regime, is complicit in war crimes being committed by aggressor Russia.

Hungary must be expelled from NATO now.

Ukraine must be admitted to NATO now.
I've tracked the alignment of the Orbán regime with the Putin regime since #RussiaInvadedUkraine in 2014.

Hungary advances its imperialist ambitions in Zakarpattia, Ukraine by exploiting the Hungarian-speaking minority there.

Hungary blocks Ukraine-NATO and Ukraine-EU meetings.
Hungarians are not the same as the Orbán regime. Belarusians are certainly not the same as the Lukashenka regime.

But the current leadership of Hungary and Belarus determines how those states behave. It's not good, when it comes to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Read 4 tweets

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