In today's #vatniksoup, I'll introduce an American social media grifter and supplements salesman, Scottson "Ayden" Sterritt (@squatsons). He's best-known for his extensive experience in geopolitics, bodybuilding and military strategy, and for his strong support for Russia.
1/20
Before starting to simp for Putin, Scottson was involved in the bodybuilding scene. His vast knowledge on geopolitics and military issues stems from his education at the prestigious Cibola High School.
2/20
In addition to grifting online, Sterritt has had another source of income: he sells protein powders, shakes, and such. As you can see from the photo (and the receding hairline) below, he's found the perfect, natural way of bodybuilding with the help of @MnmProlabs ...
3/20
...shakes and protein bars. All natural, baby.
But maybe the powder business wasn't very lucrative, and after the war started he found a nice opportunity in selling Z-merchandise, claiming its for charity and pocketing the profits.
4/20
Apparently Sterritt's main job at the moment is to tweet about the Russo-Ukrainian War. He averages about 60 tweets per day, and most, if not all, are related to the conflict.
5/20
Sterritt was also allegedly involved in the crowdfunding efforts with Sarah "Donbass Devushka" Bils. Apparently he was part of the organizing team for the merchandise, and stated that "all proceeds go to charities helping the Donbass."
While NAFO was conducting research on "Donbass Devushka", he was speculating that the "investigation is meaningless and no one care about your theories about our team." 12 days later a small local newspaper called Wall Street Journal broke the DD story on their front page.
7/20
He also tweeted that "I know her name and it isn't Sarah or whatever," which can actually be true in case Sarah had already changed her name to Lyudmila. Lyudmila might or might not be in the backseat in the last photo with Scotty.
8/20
Sterritt's most popular episode of his "Kalibrated with Scott" podcast was when he hosted the convicted sex criminal, Scott Ritter. Ritter's expertise was evident during the early days of war, when he claimed that "Ukraine is getting schooled in the art of Urban warfare."
9/20
Because of Scottson's extensive knowledge in geopolitics and military issues, he knew already back in Aug 2022, that Iranian drones weren't being sent to Russia, calling the claim "complete crap".
10/20
A month later he was selling T-shirts promoting Iranian drones,again claiming that "all proceeds go to charities helping the Donbass." I think it would be an interesting investigation to see where the money actually went.
11/20
Now, let's look briefly at Sterritt's amazing ability to do military analysis. In Aug 2022, he tweeted that Kherson "will never be Ukraine again." The city was of course recaptured by the Ukrainian forces just three months later.
12/20
He was also all about the "winter of death", many times suggesting that Ukraine wouldn't survive over the winter, and that they'd "capitulate when the power goes off".
He cheered for the Vuhledar push in Nov 2022, which turned out to be a complete failure for the Russians.
13/20
In May 2023, Scotty tweeted that Russia "never targeted civilians power infrastructure, only substations linked to rail traffic." Then, few months later he was sharing videos of Russian's targeting a power station in Kyiv. Because Scotty's consistent like that.
14/20
Sterritt's made fun of both big counteroffensives conducted by the Ukrainian forces. Back in Aug 2022, he seemed to think that the first counteroffensive was a total failure. Few months later Ukraine re-captured a lot of areas (see the before and after map below).
15/20
He's always claimed to be having higher moral standards than the rabid Shiba Inus of NAFO, but in May 2022, he tweeted this nasty gem. The tweet's now deleted, of course, as it could be a PR hit for the morale crusader Scottson.
16/20
In May 2023, Scotty appeared on an open mic podcast called Defense Politics Asia, where he discussed various topics, including Bucha. He cast doubts on the events of Bucha, suggesting that the West had started their propaganda push some time prior to the events, ...
17/20
...and emphasized that it was either "something that didn't happen" or an "isolated incident", just like the tortured people in the mass graves in Izium, constant bombing of civilian targets around Ukraine, and the children's torture chambers in Kherson.
18/20
He claimed that he's been "for peace" the whole time, and that the Ukrainians should stop fighting and negotiate for peace. I did a quick search on Scotty's tweets, but couldn't find any calls for peace prior to Putin's fake annexation of the four Ukrainian Oblasts.
19/20
Currently he is focusing on bashing the ongoing second Ukrainian counteroffensive, especially celebrating any lost vehicles that were donated by Western countries.
Don't know about you, but I'm getting some popcorn ready for Scotty's coping if the offensive is successful!
In today’s Vatnik Soup, we’ll talk about why we’re doing this: why we think Ukraine is so important and why we believe that souping vatniks and debunking their propaganda narratives is so crucial to counter Russia’s & their allies’ wars of aggression and achieve real peace.
1/20
War is expensive, and Russia is not a rich country that could afford this: Hospitals? Roads? Plumbing? No: everything into terror and destruction.
But not only that. There is a 2nd item in the Russian state budget that remains strong no matter what:
Manufacturing support for that terror and destruction. Propaganda. Vatniks. “Innocent” travel bloggers. “Independent” journalists. “Patriotic” politicians. Russia spends hundreds of billions of rubles a year ($5 billion) on this, and that kind of money buys you A LOT of BS.
In this second (and possibly last) Basiji Soup, we’ll explore how the Islamic Republic of Iran has prepared for a conflict with the US and Israel. We won’t cover the military aspects, but another kind of war — information warfare.
1/20
In the 1st Basiji Soup, we souped the Islamic Republic, its disinformation operations, its hypocrisy, its support of terrorism including Russia’s, its (one-sided?) relationship with Putin, and the mass protests against it that started two months ago:
The Internet blackout has been crucial in allowing the regime to cover up its massacre of the protesters and especially the scope of it, making it difficult to assess the number of victims. They went to great lengths to jam Starlink, after having made its use illegal.
In this 7th Debunk of the Day, we’ll expose the “Chickenhawk” fallacy. The chickenhawk accusation or the “go to the front!” imperative is a dishonest attempt to silence anyone supporting Ukraine by pushing them to go fight. A barely hidden death wish, as it’s always uttered… 1/5
…with zero regard for who you are or what your personal circumstances might be — you could already be there, on your way there, a veteran, or unable to fight. More broadly, not everyone can or should be a soldier, just as not everyone can or should be a policeman or a nurse. 2/5
Yet a society still needs those things to be done, and the fact that not everyone can go to medical school or fight crime does not mean that we have to surrender to invaders and criminals, nor that we cannot all have an opinion on healthcare. 3/5
In this 6th Debunk of the Day, we’ll talk about a complex and controversial topic: conscription. It is used by vatniks to attack Ukraine for drafting men to fight, while conveniently ignoring the alternative, including the horrors of conscription into the Russian army. 1/8
Military obligations are a reality in many countries, from the most peaceful democracies to the most tyrannical dictatorships — unless you have “bone spurs”. Some argue it is a necessity for defense against invading armies, especially for small countries. 2/8
Others point out that it goes against individual rights or that a professional army is better. And Zelenskyy might agree: he did in fact end conscription. But then a full-scale invasion happened: exactly why many nations, including the US, still keep some form of draft. 3/8
In today’s Vatnik Soup, we’ll introduce the International Olympic Committee (IOC) @Olympics . It’s mostly known for organizing sporting events, and for being supposed to foster the Olympic ideal while actually submitting to dictators.
1/15
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was founded in 1894 in Paris by Pierre de Coubertin with a noble goal: promote peace through sports. Politics out, sportsmanship in: sounds great in theory.
2/15
But in practice, the IOC has a long history of accommodating authoritarian regimes, always in the name of “neutrality,” “dialogue,” and “keeping sports separate from politics”, usually not in a particularly consistent or moral way.
In today’s Wumao Soup, we’ll tell you 15 things about the People’s Republic of China that you didn’t learn from TikTok, Douyin or DeepSeek.
1/20
This is our 2nd Wumao Soup. In the 1st one, we introduced how the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) online propaganda works. Now we’ll cover some of the big topics they hide or lie about. Think of it as an antidote soup to their propaganda.
1 - Tiananmen Square massacre
Yes, it happened. Yes, it was a massacre. Vatniks, wumaos, and tankies in the West deny it, while China censors the slightest mention of it, even the date it happened.