1/ Russian warbloggers are furious about the apparently disastrous failure of an attempt to send 100 men through a gas pipe to Sudza, who were then suffocated by the Ukrainians. "Why? Why the fuck are you doing this? For what?", asks one angry blogger. ⬇️
2/ Seemingly posting inside information before the failure of the operation was known, Anastasia Kashevarova names the units involved and provides some details of how it was carried out:
3/ "Russian soldiers walked 15 kilometers 750 meters, crawled in a gas pipe to drive the enemy out of the Kursk region. The entire operation took a week: they walked for 2 days, sat in the pipe for 4 days (waited and took a break).
4/ "Poisoned by methane, left with a minimum of food and water, our soldiers went behind enemy lines and struck.
5/ "The enemy was caught by surprise. The Ukrainian Armed Forces began throwing cluster munitions onto the pipe 30 minutes after disembarking. But the guys had already managed to enter the [target area]. They consolidated their positions and caused panic among the enemy.
6/ "The enemy panicked. Started to run. The Ukrainian Armed Forces fled to the destroyed bridge in Sudzha, abandoned their equipment and ran away on foot.
7/ "Several hundred soldiers of the Russian Armed Forces, realizing that they were probably going one way, went forward. They did not flinch, some knew they were already corpses, but they kept going. Real warriors.
8/ "Everyone was poisoned, some were also dead, but they completed the task.
10/ 'Romanov Light' pins the blame on one particular but unnamed unit, which had apparently used a similar tactic successfully in the battle of Avdiivka in 2024:
11/ "One unit, which has been very fond of PR since Avdiivka, announced the pipe idea on the basis of ‘we can do it again’ (and also taking advantage of the fact that the real details of those events were hidden from the public).
12/ "This unit also claimed to have prepared everything: ventilation, settling tanks, water and provisions, communications, etc.
But it turned out that they w̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶s̶c̶r̶e̶w̶e̶d̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ did not prepare.
Everyone on the ground knows the result.
13/ "Everyone on the ground knows the result. The question is – will there be a demand for [consequences on behalf of] those who suffocated?"
14/ "Many bloggers are critical of Kasheverova's attempts to claim the operation as a success before the resulst were even known. '5 mg KGV' offers "Congratulations to all cheap hype-eaters and "advance conquerors" on March 8! This is their holiday too."
15/ "Those who decided to play with emotions and please the enemy with their "successes" before this enemy left our land deserve congratulations on International Women's Day!"
16/ 'Ghost of Novorossiya' calls it "a very revealing situation."
"It was possible to track the behaviour of some people and draw conclusions about their seriousness, responsibility, tendency to hype or vice versa.
17/ "When some people revealed information about some features of one important operation, when this information could still cause harm. And in fact – it did.
Other people, who not only knew in advance, but also helped in its preparation, looked at it in quiet, irritated shock.
18/ "Conclusions have been drawn."
Similarly, 'NERYBAR' writes: "Running ahead of the locomotive, dependence on goyda [cries of joy] and other stories are the most harmful. It's already the 4th year of the Special Military Operation. We all want goyda."
19/ "But as soon as everyone starts spreading the good news, when only 20-30% of the work has been done, it doesn't bring the result any closer at all."
20/ 'Thirteenth' rages about the way the operation was hyped and planned:
"Here you go! Look, assholes, at the results of your hype. This video is from [Ukrainian] sources."
21/ "I'll tell you something now! One/two/three groups successfully reaching the point and gaining a foothold there - that's half the trouble...
Here the question immediately arises! [What about] logistics?
22/ "Food, water, ammunition, communications, charging electrical devices, power banks, approach of the main forces, evacuation of the wounded... (and even stupidly to the toilet, how the boys can go)
Two or three groups in the rear without all this - that's a disaster.
23/ "To set everything up and implement it, you need, like, a week...
Why? Why the fuck are you doing this?
For what?
You are all awesome guys. But your information on the network works for the enemy.
24/ "You apparently do not fully understand the power of the information space and the fact that your "hype posts" are stupidly killing our men. The Ukrainians read everything carefully and know that 70% of you are clinical cretins.
25/ "What can you expect from you? The tactics are shitty. You yourselves should be thrown into this pipe..." /end
1/ Why has Donald Trump been demanding that Ukraine pay the US $500 billion, and how is this likely to be a demonstration of the principle of Trump's Razor?
2/ In early February 2025, Trump told journalists: "I told them [Ukraine] that I want the equivalent, like 500 billion worth of rare earth [sic]. And they've essentially agreed to do that, so at least we don’t feel stupid."
3/ Since then, commentators have tried to work out the basis of this $500 billion demand. It has caused a great deal of puzzlement given that the US has only spent between $119.7bn – $182.8bn on supporting Ukraine and European allies.
1/ A recent shooting at a Moscow shopping mall has highlighted a deepening crisis among Russia's internal security forces. They are chronically underpaid, massively under strength and have lost vast numbers of personnel to Russia's war effort against Ukraine. ⬇️
2/ On 2 March 2025, 24-year-old Danila Potekhin was refused entry to the Krasny Kit shopping mall in Mytishchi in the Moscow region. He returned and tried to force his way in, firing six shots from a Grand Power T12 less-lethal pistol which moderately injured four guards.
3/ Potekhin admitted under interrogation that he was an lieutenant in the Federal Protective Service (FSO), a 50,000-strong force that guards top officials and government buildings such as the Kremlin. He was moonlighting as an Uber Eats-style food delivery courier.
1/ Donald Trump may be aiming to annex the Great Lakes – and possibly south-eastern Ontario in a maximalist scenario – and kick Canada out of NORAD, judging by first-hand accounts of talks between Canada and the Trump Administration. ⬇️
2/ The New York Times reports on first-hand accounts of what has been said in trade talks between the US and Canada, which led to Canadian PM Justin Trudeau saying publicly on March 4th that he believed Trump wanted to annex Canada.
3/ According to the NYT, Trump has told Trudeau that "he did not believe that the treaty that demarcates the border between the two countries was valid and that he wants to revise the boundary. He offered no further explanation."
1/ This is a hugely important finding from @jburnmurdoch (do follow him, he's one of the very best data analysts in the media). The US right is increasingly convergent with Putinism, and is leaving right-wing parties in other countries far behind.
2/ This can clearly be seen in UK polling, where sentiment towards Trump has become extremely negative across the entire political spectrum, including the most right-wing elements.
3/ As for why, @aselrod makes a good case in @BulwarkOnline that this is because Trump and the MAGA movement are essentially converting the historically anti-democratic culture of the American South into the ruling ideology of the US government. thebulwark.com/p/liberal-demo…
1/ Cash bonuses are incentivising Russian commanders to compete with each other to mount bloody assaults for symbolic or propaganda benefit, rather than doing slower but more useful work such as cutting off logistics, according to Russian warbloggers. ⬇️
2/ The 'Reporter Filatov' Telegram channel writes about the perverse incentives driving Russian army tactics in Ukraine (referring, as usual, to the "Laotian army" as a means of evading the censors):
3/ "I heard this about the Laotian army. And this is wonderful. Capitalism should have KPI [key performance indicators] and all that evaluation about successful success.
1/ As many as 5,000 Cubans may be fighting for Russia against Ukraine, according to investigative journalists. While some were likely tricked into joining the Russian army, many have signed up to escape grinding poverty in Cuba. ⬇️
2/ Russia has recruited people from many countries with historic links to the former Soviet Union, including in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The Cuban contingent, with an estimated 5,000 men, may be the second largest after that of North Korea.
3/ Russian recruiters have used Facebook and other social media sites to contact Cubans online. In some cases they appear to have used deception, promising them jobs as cooks or construction workers but then giving them Russian army contracts to sign.