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Anders Östlund - Ї △ Profile picture
Anders Östlund - Ї △
@andersostlund
Swede by birth, European by choice. Live in Kyiv but is temporarily abroad. I try to reply to comments but time is a constraint.
27 subscribers
Nov 10 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
It took 80 years for fascism to return. How it could happen is for historians and sociologists to figure out. What we need to do is to step up and fight it. Appeasement should have ended 25 years ago so the change of direction is well over due. As during the 30s fascism now has many names but whether it's fundamentalists in Iran, communists in China, Putinists in Russia or MAGA in the U.S., it's really fascism.
Nov 3 • 18 tweets • 4 min read
Great thread by Sergej. I'd like to add some comments and reflections. First, I am not sure the West has any goal for a post-war world. The idea now appears to be mostly to wait and see, do as little as possible, make statements of concern, put the head in the sand. 1. It must be really nice for Russia to know that those it consider its mortal enemies protect Russia from losing the war. Talk about strategic and tactic freedom. Like playing a board game with your mother when you were a kid and she cheats to your advantage. 2.
Aug 17 • 12 tweets • 3 min read
I am not much for conspiracy theories but here we have three news items that sits nicely together. 1. Biden is not using funds for Ukraine, 2. Germany is planning to cut almost all aid to Ukraine, and 3. Negotiations between Russia and Ukraine was about to happen. Biden was planning to get reelected in November, Scholz in September next year. Maybe both had an idea about "peace" or "cease fire" in Ukraine as a part of their election campaigns? There has just been too much talk about negotiations lately for it to be just random.
Aug 12 • 28 tweets • 5 min read
It's time to once and for all remove the idea of successful negotiations with Russia from the agenda. There are many reasons for it. I will just list a few. First of all. To understand Russia one have to accept two things.
1. Putin equals his own interests with Russia's, and Putin's primary goal is to stay in power at all cost. It doesn't matter to him how much the Russian people suffer as long as he stays.
Aug 9, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
First, they thought Russia would win in two days, then they thought Russia would win in a year, then they thought Ukraine couldn't take back territory. Now they think Ukraine can't handle a minefield or cross a river. It certainly serve Ukraine that Russians think Ukrainians are complete idiots, incapable of any meaningful activity, but that some in the West has bought into that line of thinking has constantly damaged Ukraine's chances of getting the arms it needs.
Dec 17, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Always a pleasure when @LawDavF publish a new article.
"Ukraine threatened Russia because of the potential contagion effect of the ‘Orange’ revolution of 2004 and the EuroMaidan movement of 2014. To understand the sources of conflict these factors cannot be ignored." My conclusion is that Russia feels threatened by the change of value system in Ukraine and its drift westward. If this is a correct assumption the war is one between civilisations and that means it cannot be solved by negotiations or territorial concessions.
Dec 1, 2022 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
NATO enlargement and the invasion of Crimea are good for finding out a persons real views on Russia. Arguing that NATO's enlargement is a valid reason for Russian aggression is in fact the same as saying to millions of people in Eastern Europe that they shouldn't be free and independent. Because they would be in Ukraine's situation if not for NATO.
Nov 29, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Why is @Tsihanouskaya and her government in exile not resisting Russian occupation of Belarus and the Lukashenka regime's participation in the against Ukraine? The time for words ended long time ago. Further passivity will reflect very bad on the government in exile. @Tsihanouskaya Let me clarify what I meant about @Tsihanouskaya's government in exile. What I would like to see is partisan warfare. neutralization of collaborators, destruction of Russian military equipment. Belarusians need to fight Russia or they will eventually become complicit.
Nov 19, 2022 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
There will be no peace in Europe as long as Russia has enough resources to continue fighting. Russia has no interest in peace so the only way to achieve it is to remove Russia's capacity to fight. The only outcome from diplomacy with Russia will be a Steinmeier-peace*, one that isn't really peace but a state with less intense fighting for some time while Russia prepare a new attack. *Named after German appeaser and Putin-friend Frank Walter Steinmeier.
Nov 17, 2022 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Easier for NATO to deal with a stray Ukrainian air defense missile accidentally hitting a NATO country. instead of a Russian cruise missile. Russia is to blame in both cases but with a Russian missile hitting Poland NATO would have to take action. Remember the nonsense about "little green men" in Donbas in 2014? Everybody knew they were Russian special forces but saying so would have serious consequences so better not say it.
Nov 16, 2022 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
During my military service the army referred to cold as "the other enemy". It's easy to understand how to dress correctly to stay warm but what is equally important is to stay dry. Wet makes you cold, and makes your weapons and vehicles to malfunction. In my experience Ukrainian winters are not that hard but temperatures can drop to minus 20C and snow is not uncommon. Constantly removing snow from yourself is important and changing shirts and socks after and during physical activity is also very important to stay dry.
Nov 14, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
It appears the 6th Battle for Donbass has commenced. @TheStudyofWar consider it to be a grave mistake by Russia to go on the offensive but urge us not to interrupt Putin while he is making this mistake.
understandingwar.org/backgrounder/r… It is likely that Russia will waste units not yet ready for battle at a time of the year not optimal for maneuver warfare, because of the wet ground. Ukraine thus has an opportunity to grind Russia down again and eventually go on the counteroffensive.
Oct 20, 2022 • 22 tweets • 4 min read
Steinmeier is a symbol for the worst form of appeasement there is. Steinmeier has enabled the rise of fascist Russia for 20 years and will surely be looked upon in history as a source of both shame and embarrassment for Germany. Steinmeier has always put Russia's interests first. He has always protected Russia and always tried to limit opposition against Russia. Steinmeier portraited himself as a mediator in the war in Donbas from 2014 but in reality he always took Russia's side against Ukraine.
Oct 19, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
The situation in the occupied territories is about to get a lot worse for civilians. Russia could do whatever already since it never cared about any laws so "martial law" is just used for propaganda to justify increased terror against the population. Russia also introduce a version of martial law in occupied Crimea and Russian territories close to Ukraine, shown as orange and yellow in the thread below. Russia continue taking small steps towards putting the entire nation on a war footing.
Oct 19, 2022 • 17 tweets • 3 min read
The conflict will not be over until the Russian state is beaten, Putin or no Putin. After the war in Ukraine is over it will have to continue, with other means, in Russia until the ultimate victory. The general hints at this in the interview attached below. Letting Russia off the hook after it's pushed out of Ukraine will not be enough. Russia would only rearm and come back. The situation is like with NaziGermany, a total reset is needed. The Russian state needs to be destroyed but it can probably only be done from the inside.
Oct 16, 2022 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
Both @ulrichspeck and @DrRadchenko are very talented analysts but the conclusion below and Radcehcnko's tweet it's based on lack a few pieces that leads the thinking the wrong way in my opinion. First, Zelensky is not the hardliner in Ukraine. I think he would have been willing to negotiate about Crimea and he hinted about it in the spring. However, Zelensky answers to the Ukrainian people and they are real hardliners now.
Oct 10, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
If Russia thinks their barbarism will lessen Ukrainian resolve they are truly mistaken. Atrocities only increase the fury. Russians who are not totally devoted to stopping the state terror executed in their name are scumbags too. i feel nothing but contempt towards the miserable cowards.
Sep 29, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Belarus needs an uprising. @Tsihanouskaya and her government in exile should probably think in terms of armed resistance now. A ground attack against Ukraine will lead to more dead Belarusians compared with an armed uprising. @Tsihanouskaya Besides the dead it will be hard to heal the mental bonds between Ukrainians and Belarusians if there will be a ground war. It's bad enough that Belarus is in war with Ukraine by letting Russia attack from its territory.
Sep 25, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Russia attacked with its well equipped regular army and was beaten by a Ukraine who at the beginning was short of trained troops and modern equipment. Now Russia will be sending untrained and ill equipped men to meet a huge Ukrainian army that is well trained and well equipped. Summary: A weaker Ukraine destroyed Russia's best forces. Now a stronger Ukraine will take on Russia's untrained recruits who are equipped with scrap metal.
Sep 25, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Pro-Russia defensive lines on the Western front:
- Protects Russian speakers' rights
- NATO promised not to expand, Russia has legit security concerns
- Don't send weapons, Ukraine can't win anyway
- Sanctions will hurt us more than Russia
- Compromise to save Ukrainian lives - Banning Russians from entry to the EU is counterproductive, Russians will learn democracy in EU
- Russian opposition, that never demanded return of Crimea, must be able to hide in the EU
- Draft dodgers are really not only saving their own skin but political activists
Sep 22, 2022 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
Distinction between those who have a Russian vs those with Ukrainian perspective. The ones with Russian perspective find a prison sentence for demonstrating horrible. The ones with a Ukrainian perspective find being raped tortured and killed just for being Ukrainian horrible. Some of the Russian centrists are going so far I would venture to say they are trivializing genocide when they compare the fate of an arrested Russian opposition activist with Ukrainians who are raped, tortured and murdered based only on ethnicity.