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Tom Warner Profile picture
Tom Warner
@warnerta
Former (if there is such a thing) Ukraine correspondent, with classicist and economist alter-egos.
14 subscribers
Oct 18 • 12 tweets • 4 min read
So let me tell you the true story of Rurik of Novgorod and his descendants and to what extent they link Ukraine to Russia. I'll stick to the simplest and most amusing parts.

First, Rurik never existed. Or to be more precise ... Image Rurik of Novgorod is a fictional character of fantasy history, very loosely based on Roric of Dorestad, a mid-9th century Viking ruler of Friesland. Roric never visited Novgorod or anywhere in what is now Russia and has nothing to do with Russian history. Image
Aug 25, 2024 • 12 tweets • 4 min read
So what's really going on with the arrest of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov's arrest in France? Why is Russia so furious?

Because the legal proceedings against Durov are likely to expose and ruin a growing Kremlin infiltration of Western and Asian social media and alt-finance. Many people have been misled into believing that Durov's long, complex relationship with the Kremlin was broken when Putin and his cronies squeezed Durov out of his first social media company, VKontakte.
theverge.com/2014/1/31/5363…
Aug 11, 2024 • 15 tweets • 3 min read
If true - if Russia deliberately uses conscripts to hold the fronts against Ukraine's incursion - then for the first time conscripts are a big part of this war. So let's talk about what makes conscripts so different from mobiks and also so different from Soviet-era conscripts. 🧵 Since 2008, Russia has had a mostly professional army. That changed in fall '22 when Putin was forced to admit his initial ground forces of about 200k professional soldiers weren't enough for this war. So he ordered a "mobilizatsia" of 300k more fighters: hence, the mobiks.
Aug 7, 2024 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
This is a good thread everyone should read, but it misses:
- This was planned before the current crisis near Pokrovsk.
- It responds to the Kharkiv offensive, exposing its vulnerability to outflanking.
- It humiliates Putin & his army just when recruiting is becoming harder. Rob's right that this maneuver could flop badly if Ukraine gets trapped in Russia and takes big losses. But he overestimates the combat-effectiveness of the largely conscript forces in Kursk.
May 14, 2023 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Here's a thesis to make Russian hypernationalist veins burst.

In the coming offensive, Ukraine will both outgun and outman Russia.

One reason Ukraine has already turned the war’s tide is that after months of defensive fighting for attrition, Russia's manpower advantage is gone. Among all the arguing over Russian casualty numbers, a couple figures in the news went little noticed.
On May 2, Gen. Milley estimated Russia's current troop strength in Ukraine at "around 200,000".
foreignaffairs.com/podcasts/how-t… Image
Dec 3, 2022 • 26 tweets • 7 min read
THE TWITTER FILES NOTHING BURGER :
How a dumbass far-right billionaire and a crappy former Moscow Exile reporter stumbled over themselves trying to invent a story that Twitter suppressed a big 2020 election scandal. 🧵 Tonight Elon Musk, the tech mogul who bought Twitter to welcome back neo-Nazis, and Matt Taibbi, the gonzo denouncer of "blood-sucking" bankers, published their joint project THE TWITTER FILES, which purports to expose a Democrat conspiracy to suppress a 2020 election scandal. /2
Nov 25, 2022 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
This little video is truly incredible. I recommend everybody watch it several times, to let it sink in. It says so much about why Russia is losing this war. A short thread. It shows a Ukrainian drone dropping a small grenade on a group of 11 Russian soldiers huddled sleeping in a (weakly) defensive dug-out pit, on the front line east of Bakhmut. What's amazing to watch is how sluggishly - if at all - the men react.
Nov 17, 2022 • 24 tweets • 5 min read
It was a good verdict today. But one point should be clarified. Aside from his superiors in Moscow, the person most responsible for shooting down MH17 was this guy: GRU officer Sergei Dubinsky, who also went by the call sign "Khmury" and the pseudonym Sergei Petrovsky. 1/x Image The media has focused more on FSB officer Igor Girkin, who according to the verdict was Dubinsky's "superior" and so the highest-ranking person involved. But this conclusion stems entirely from Girkin's formal title as "defense minister" of the "Donetsk People's Republic." 2/x Image
Oct 19, 2022 • 13 tweets • 3 min read
Putin's declaration of martial law in parts of Ukraine was meaningless, but he did something else today more important and telling. He introduced a kind of martial law across Russia, in what looks like an effort to preempt the possibility of revolt. Here's the details:🧵
1/13 Most of Russia, except the pink and yellow regions of this map, was ordered under a state of "basic readiness". In these areas regional governors are authorized to:
1) Strenghen the protection of public order and ensure public safety.
2/13

kremlin-ru.translate.goog/events/preside…
Oct 19, 2022 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
Why is Russia starting to admit it can't hold Kherson and the rest of the area it still occupies northwest of the Dnipro? The change might owe as much to the recent destruction of the bridge in Crimea as it does to the threat of another Ukrainian offensive in the area.🧵 With the bridge over the Kerch Strait indefinitely unusable for trucks and trains, Russia's supply lines to southern Ukraine have been severely constricted. For supply by rail Russia now controls only one crucial line into south Ukraine.
Sep 30, 2022 • 11 tweets • 4 min read
With Russians now thought to be belatedly attempting to retreat from the Lyman area, let's review how rapidly their position has deteriorated since I first posted on Ukraine's latest major offensive and look at what if any avenues for escape might still be open. 🧵 This Sep. 29 Russian map (t.me/rybar/39542) is about right, if one reads the striped area meant to be contested land as mostly Ukraine-controlled. In a nutshell, two Ukrainian forces broke through Russian lines north and east of Lyman, and by today they had nearly met.
Sep 27, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
It's interesting how Russian propagandists are now the quickest to report Ukrainian advances. Rybar (Telegram) reports today UAF has crossed the Donets in force near Kreminna, and the road to Lyman from the east is under fire and unsafe. Here's their map to read with caveats. 🧵 If true, Russia is quickly losing safe road routes to supply the Lyman area, and its occupation of the NE corner of Donetsk oblast is about to collapse. Rybar reported yesterday that UAF capture Nove, cutting another main road route to Lyman from the north.
Sep 19, 2022 • 10 tweets • 3 min read
I see one answer to two puzzles about the recent course of this war. Why did Russia leave Kharkiv oblast so exposed? And why is Russia now focusing on tiny gains in Bakhmut while weakly countering Ukraine's preparations for another NE offensive? In short: Potemkin syndrome.🧵 Russia didn't just fail to react to Ukraine's build-up in Kharkiv. @DefMon3 has compiled evidence that Russia was drawing down troop levels in the region, leading him to suggest that Russia might have been attacked while already planning a withdrawal. /2
Sep 18, 2022 • 10 tweets • 4 min read
A thread on Russia's rail supply lines to its occupying forces in Ukraine - how these have been affected by the recent Kharkiv offensive, and what's likely to happen next if, as I expect, Ukraine moves next to retake northern Luhansk oblast. 🧵 With minor corrections plus Sumy and Russian rail junctions The hubs of the rail network supplying Russia's occupation of northeast Ukraine are laid out like a pyramid. At the top is the primary supply hub Voronezh, then the junctions of Stary Oskol and Liski, and finally the forward supply hubs of Belgorod, Valuyki and Millerovo. /2
Sep 16, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
After five days of Ukraine's northeast advance being paused at the Oskil river, we are starting to hear plausible rumors of preparations for a continuation. According to two Russian milbloggers monitored by ISW, things are afoot along the north and south parts of the river.🧵 By one account, the Ukrainian army has crossed the Oskil and emplaced artillery at Hryanykivka, about 25km SW from where the Oskil enters Ukraine from Russia. If true this is either very bold, or Russian forces in the NE remain very weak. Image
Sep 8, 2022 • 9 tweets • 3 min read
The Balaklia offensive makes this 3-month-old map relevant again. It's all about Russia's attempt to make a very long front more defensible in order to stalemate Ukraine into accepting a frozen conflict. The difference is, now Ukraine has the initiative. 🧵 In June, my point was that Russia knew its offensive capacity was dwindling, so its targets were chosen to improve defensibility. Taking Ukraine-held pockets NE of the Donets would turn the river into a defensive barrier, and taking the Lysychansk area would shorten the front. /2
Aug 23, 2022 • 13 tweets • 3 min read
Today's Trump filing in short. 🧵
1) There's a 10-page retelling of the case so far, mainly arguing that Trump was fully cooperating. It's frivolous. Notably, it hints he might want to use his silly "I declassified everything" claim in court.
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco… 2) pp. 11-12 argue the warrant was overbroad by allowing seizure of case-unrelated items merely in the vicinity of case-related items. This will matter and will be a court fight if agents found and seized something incriminating unrelated to presidential documents.
Aug 21, 2022 • 17 tweets • 4 min read
I want to revisit the topic of Ukrainian vs Russian views of the Turkic world, because Kamil blocked me for arguing, which seems cowardly. Kamil writes much I like, but I think he's more Russified and ignorant of Ukraine than he realizes. /kamilkazani/status/1551383280498483207 Image In this thread, Kamil set out the position that Ukrainians learned to believe Turkic and steppe cultures were inferior from their former hegemon, Russia. While surely that influence matters, Kamil made two big, glaring mistakes, which deserve to be rebutted. Image
Aug 14, 2022 • 25 tweets • 9 min read
A thread explaining how very serious the espionage case against Trump is. We still don't know what information he took home and twice withheld from official demands. But if we read the investigation documents and the law, it becomes clear that he's likely to go down for life.🧵 The section of espionage law that Trump is being investigated under is 18 USC § 793, according to the search warrant for the recent FBI raid of his home.
documentcloud.org/documents/2213…
Jul 6, 2022 • 28 tweets • 9 min read
Big Fires of the HIMARS Era

A continuing thread counting the large fires in Russian-held territory since Ukraine deployed HIMARS. Most, but not all, are HIMARS hits of ammunition depots.

Additions and informative comments very welcome. Please hurrah elsewhere. Trolls banned.🧵 Ukraine has been successfully targeting ammunition depots throughout the war. This graphic made June 30 focuses on pre-HIMARS era hits.
The hit June 21 on Khrustalny, ex-Krasny Luch, was especially impressive.
Jun 4, 2022 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
A map for the day. The point here is to look at the population density of the two regions Russia has captured in this war. They are among the least urbanized regions of Ukraine. What Russia has mainly conquered is a lot of farmland. Crimea, largely a tourism resort, and the part of east Ukraine surrounded by an orange line, which is heavily industrialized, have been occupied by Russia since 2014. The area that Russia has captured in this war are in the northeast and center-south. They are rural.