1/ Citizens of the puppet 'Donetsk People's Republic' (DNR) are complaining en masse that they are not being paid their promised compensation for deaths and injuries caused to local residents by the war. The DNR itself admits that it owes more than 38 billion rubles ($467m). ⬇️
2/ Relatives and soldiers of the DNR's armed forces – which have been decimated due to being used as so-called 'meat waves' against Ukrainian positions – have been posting numerous videos complaining about the lack of compensation payments and appealing to Putin for help.
3/ In one video, a wife says: "Starting from September 2022, funding for lump-sum compensation for wounded and killed DNR servicemen for 2022 was terminated. We submitted documents to the commission of the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy of the DNR.
4/ "There are a lot of us. We applied to all authorities. From the presidential administration to the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation.
5/ "All our appeals are forwarded to the government of the DNR, which redirects them to the Ministry of Labour, and the answers come from there that there is no funding. We write to the deputies and there are no results."
6/ According to the wife of one wounded soldier, his unit "collected all the necessary documents promptly, the medical examiner issued a conclusion of a severe injury.
7/ "In November we submitted all the documents for payment, and for seven months there have been no payments, the allowance during treatment is 30,000 rubles ($371). The answer is the same, there is no funding."
8/ People seeking compensation have complained to the DNR state prosecutor's office, which admitted that an audit had "established the fact of lack of funding for this type of payment, which requires an amount of more than 38 billion rubles."
9/ It's very unlikely that the DNR will be able to pay the sums it owes, as its finances are precarious, its economy is a mess and it's kept afloat only by Russian government funding.
10/ The Russian government has shown little concern previously for the welfare of DNR soldiers and their families, so there seems to be little likelihood that the relatives' video appeals will achieve much. /end
1/ Russia should take advantage of the Iran war by launching a massive war-winning offensive to capture Kyiv and Odesa, says a prominent Russian warblogger. The conditions he identifies for Russia doing so, however, are so onerous that they are practically impossible to meet. ⬇️
2/ Alexey Zhivov asks:
"How is victory possible in the Special Military Operation?
After the capture of Pokrovsk, Myrnohrad, and the battle for Kupiansk, any significant news about the advancement of the Russian Armed Forces has ceased to come from the front."
3/ "All military action was reduced to an exchange of missile and drone strikes and [Kremlin spokesman Dmitry] Peskov's inappropriate statements about our great "concern" for the legitimacy of the Ukrainian government."
1/ The Russian army is recruiting alcoholics directly from rehab and sending them to the front line, according to a serving Russian soldier, who says they "couldn't even walk, and they're also just plain sick in the head." It highlights how Russia is using 'disposable' men. ⬇️
2/ In the undated video below, an unnamed Russian soldier complains about the latest replenishments in his detachment, who are to be sent to assault squads: "They've got a bunch of fucking cripples. They couldn't even walk, and they're also just plain sick in the head."
3/ If the men refuse, they are badly beaten. The commanders are indifferent to the recruits' condition, despite the gruelling task they face of crossing vast open fields with no cover from Ukrainian artillery and drones:
1/ Russian forces are struggling to communicate without Starlink, according to a commentary by Russia's prominent warblogging channel Rybar on Telegram. It says that Ukraine's position has improved and its losses have fallen due to the shutdown of Starlink for Russian forces. ⬇️
2/ Rybar writes:
"A month and a half has passed since Starlink ceased operation for Russian troops in the Special Military Operation. The situation has partially stabilised in some areas, but the overall problems remain.
3/ "Elon Musk's terminals provided essential communication and operational efficiency on the front lines, as well as supporting the operation of both drones and ground robotic systems.
1/ Russia's Telegram ban and Internet blocks risk having a counter-productive effect similar to Prohibition in the US a century ago, warn Russian commentators – driving people to acts of civic resistance and pushing them into ideologically unsound spaces. ⬇️
2/ Sergey Kolyashnikov notes how the alcohol ban imposed on the US during Prohibition backfired by turning millions of people into lawbreakers and spurring the growth of the Italian mafia and others seeking to bypass the ban for profit. He sees a similar phenomenon now in Russia:
3/ "Consider the market potential for all sorts of blocking bypass tools. Especially since a significant portion of the audience was already using them to access YouTube and Instagram.
1/ Russian forces have suffered a major defeat near Lyman, with the loss of numerous men and armoured vehicles. The survivors complain that the Ukrainians "fucked us up like pigs at the slaughterhouse" and accuse a Russian general of a reckless gamble. ⬇️
2/ A frontline soldier writing in the 'Management Speaks' Telegram channel gives a furious and graphic account of what happened, in a since-deleted post that also highlights the ongoing collapse in fundraising since Telegram was blocked for many Russians:
3/ "Brothers, no matter what kind of fuckery happens, I'm in it till the very end. I won't lie — they fucked us up like pigs at the slaughterhouse, and I'm ashamed of this shit in front of the families of the guys, not in front of you.
1/ Has Donald Trump accidentally recreated, in an even more severe form, the energy crisis that doomed Jimmy Carter's presidency? A comparison with the 1979 oil crisis shows worrying parallels with the current situation. ⬇️
2/ In August 2023, former Fed chair Larry Summers (@LHSummers) noted this in the Washington Post: "It is sobering to recall that the shape of the past decade’s inflation curve almost perfectly shadows its path from 1966 to 1976 before it accelerated in the late 1970s."
3/ What caused that acceleration? The most immediate trigger was the Iranian Revolution in early 1979, which brought Ayatollah Khomeini to power. The turmoil caused by the revolution caused Iran's oil exports to drop from about 6 million barrels per day to only about 1.5 million.