Please, Help Saker.

I post it here, for people who can afford to help Andrei Raevsky because he lost his home in hurricane in Florida. Please donate! It is a tragedy for any family... 

The following post was put together by the Saker team.. The team includes our translators, the staff of the related Saker sites the Spanish, Italian, French, Serbian, and technical support.Herb

Dear vineyard community and friendsAs we all know, our friend and host and his family are going through a very harsh time due to hurricane Ian.We are worried about them and would like to help them get back to normal life. That is why we kindly ask anyone who is able and willing to help, to please do so through the contribution possibilities offered in the blog.We thank our Lord  Jesus Christ for his help to this family in need as well as for all of us who do have a warm bed and food to share with them. May all be blessed.

Your Saker Community Team

 Please visit Saker's Donation page. 

Now, Russia Is Finished...

Because mighty UK finally pulled the plug, LOL)) That will show those Roosskies. 

The UK has placed new sanctions on Russia, blocking its citizens and businesses from purchasing an array of services from British firms, over the Kremlin’s decision to annex four regions of Ukraine. The new sanctions seek to further damage Russia’s economy by hindering the country’s access to IT consultancy, architectural, engineering, accounting, and commercial legal services from UK firms. Russia currently imports more than two-thirds (67 percent) of its services from countries that have already sanctioned the Russian Federation over its invasion of Ukraine. The Russian Federation is particularly on the UK for audit and commercial legal services due to London’s position as one of the world’s leading professional services hubs. The new sanctions expand on the UK government’s May package that banned service firms including consultancies and PR agencies from working with Russia. However, the May package let lawyers continue working with Russia, despite criticism of the role law firms have played in enabling Russian oligarchs, particularly through the use of libel threats. The new package is set to ban lawyers from providing “transactional legal advisory services” to Russian businesses, but will let law firms continue providing other limited legal services to the country. Ross Denton, head of international trade at Ashurst, said the “prohibition is likely intended to relate to new M&A and commercial contracts.” However, Denton warned the new sanctions could “encourage some law firms to start supplying services to Russian persons as the UK will have set out what services are prohibited, thus establishing what services would be legal.

You could see the thunder clouds gathering over horizon for Russia when UK committed the atrocity against Russians a few years ago by banning London's gay version of famous Tchaikovsky's ballet  The Swan Lake to travel to Russia, many Moscow intellectuals ended up trying to commit suicide. But now this, good Lord, what have you done Foggy Albion to Russians. Kremlin is desperately trying to come up with Declaration of Unconditional Surrender but... they have no lawyers to properly write it. So, no cigar, I guess. 

It is not an accident that Maxim Sokolov of Ria wrote yesterday a piece which explains that combined West is experiencing an anthropological catastrophe (in Russian), which is a euphemism for primarily degenerates constituting Western "elites" and it is difficult not to agree with Sokolov. Have you listened to Mr. Petraeus lately? The guy doesn't understand simplest military-technological things, because he spews an amateurish crap even many gamers from mama's basement understand better than him. Can you reason with these people? Nope. But even these morons, while trying to project the tough image evidently have some sense of self-preservation, despite being pathological liars. 

Biden adviser: US in private talks with Russia over nuclear weapons to avoid public ‘tit for tat’ 

Sure, the problem, of course, is in the fact, as I already stated, that you cannot negotiate anything with these people--you just have to tell them what expects them and for the cretin Petraeus who wants to sink Russian ships, somebody has to show him this news, which, for some reason, created panic in Western media. 

A top-of-the-line Russian nuclear-powered submarine has gone missing from its harbor in the Arctic along with its rumored "doomsday weapon," according to multiple reports. NATO has reportedly warned members that Russia's Belgorod submarine no longer appeared to be operating out of its White Sea base, where it has been active since July. Officials warned that Russia may plan to test Belgorod's "Poseidon" weapons system, a drone equipped with a nuclear bomb that Russia has claimed is capable of creating a "radioactive tsunami," according to Italian media. The drone can be deployed from the submarine at any time and detonated at a depth of 1 kilometer near a coastal city. Russian state media has claimed the device can create a 1,600-ft. wave that smashes into the coast and irradiates it.

Somebody has to explain to Petraeus and his ilk of "generals" who lost everything (wars) they ever fought, that Belgorod carries 6 Poseidon drones and those, having unlimited range and speeds in excess of 100 knots, are not interceptable by any existing ASW means and they carry not only nuclear ordnance, but also can carry a shitload of conventional explosives in lieu of nukes, and that means that a single Belgorod can sink 6 US Navy nuclear aircraft carriers. And I mean literally blow them out of the water by conventional explosives. Does he want to play this game? 

Somebody explain this to him, please. But don't hold your breath--the issue is anthropological. Plus, Belgorod is still in trials mode for weapon systems, wink, wink. 

Mr. Smith Looks At The Whole Picture.

Larry posted a great piece by Helmholtz Smith. After setting up a strategic framework, Smith concludes:

PREMONITIONS OF WHAT?

In short, the Western plan is not working. The sanctions cost the West more, it’s running out of weapons to send and there are signs of softening. If Moscow’s plan was to move slowly and wait them out, then it’s working.

One should not rule out the possibility of a negotiated settlement and it may be that NATO realizes in time that it has painted itself into a corner from which that is the only exit. But it’s hard to see, given all the hyperbole, how the West’s present rulers could admit to such an enormous failure. Electoral replacement, while happening, is too slow. And why would Moscow ever trust anything the West says? A unilateral surrender by Kiev is possible but the only way I could see it is if Zelensky were overthrown. Therefore I rate a negotiated ending as not impossible at the moment but of very low probability. But time is on Russia’s side and October’s improbability may be March’s desperate desire.

More likely to me is, to use a World War II analogy, that now that Kiev’s Operation Citadel in the Kursk Salient is petering out, it’s time for a really powerful mechanized offensive accompanied by strikes deep in the rear with no holding back. One must remember that Putin said they hadn’t really started – I think we’re about to see what he meant. And sooner, I would guess, rather than later. I can’t imagine that anyone in Moscow wants this thing still going on next February.

It is a great piece, especially in illuminating a background of it all and reminding, that Ukraine is just one piece of a truly global puzzle. Per those echelons, saw them myself--huge number of armor and other equipment is being moved by Russia. This is from yesterday--150 kilometers from Ukraine's border. 

Pay attention to the combat modules (turrets) on these BTR-82s, could it be BTR-82AT with BTR-BM module?

I will not be surprised. And yes, the number of such trains since September 20th is astounding. Saw a huge one today in Crimea--tanks...

Larch's Excellent Summary + My Video.

Both Larch's succinct summary and my new video are essentially in unison. 

Putin set the goals of the SMO. The demilitarization of an enormous military, stocked for eight years and restocked feverishly from the bases and warehouses of 30 countries in NATO, is going very well. The Ukies had 750,000 men in trenches and fortified positions and embedded in big cities, shielded by civilians everywhere from Kiev to the smallest settlement in Donbass.Ukraine had a significant air force and stout air defenses with BUKs and S-300s in large numbers.

The Russians have reduced this order of battle markedly. The navy of Ukraine is gone. It has no functioning naval bases. The Ukie air defenses have been reduced to mobile radars and a few extant S-300s. The most effective air defense they have is the tactic of massing MANPADS and receiving real time alerts from NATO of oncoming Russian jets and helos. This has not stopped the Russian aerospace forces, though it is a hampering defense that has to be recognized as a threat. The Ukie air force is 95% gone, only replenished from NATO with aircraft that stay in the battle for minutes before they are reduced to losses.

Over 500,000 Ukies are gone, dead and forever off the battlefield. Thousands of mercs have been killed or chased off the battlefield.

The entire junior officer echelon of Ukraine is gone. US and NATO officers are the tactical commanders, as communications in the battlefield document. American and British voices give the commands. Videos are available as proof.

Every strategic offensive launched by Kiev (and the NATO command running their military) has been destroyed. The only ground they have gained is ground ceded in order to draw the Ukies into the open or to reposition Russian forces to better lines of defense.

The Ukies have lost forever Mariupol, Kherson, Melitopol, all of Lugansk, 65% of Donetsk, their access to the sea (except with Russian permission at Odessa), the air space over most of Ukraine, and sovereign control over their utilities and transport systems which exist only as long as the Russians allow. Ukraine is under its 4th total mobilization. By winter's end it will have lost another 100,000 of their cannon fodder. Likely, too, they will have lost what they hold in Donetsk oblast.

The Russians have done this while exposing only 15% of their military. It is clear from signs in Chechnya, Kadyrov could gather 100,000 extra men who want to join the Chechen forces from the Caucuses and other brotherly muslim lands.

There are also ample signs that Syrians and some African fighters want to join Russia in the battle against the Hegemon. Another 100,000 foreigners could easily be brought to Ukraine, if needed.

So, Russia has enormous depth of reserves beyond its own manpower potential.

What the generals have done is send steel and explosives to demilitarize the Ukraine, not manpower. Artillery, bombs, rockets and missiles are fighting the war, saving Russian manpower while decimating Ukie force structure.

As I view the war, it is going very well for the mission Putin set.

Do I think it is optimal? If you take the SMO as a small part of a larger war (which it is in fact), this small war is going very well. Ukraine will be destroyed and NATO will have no proxy. NATO will have to send its own manpower. That stage of warfare will fracture the Alliance. The US will have to coerce a new proxy force to fight Russia out in the open sectors of Ukraine. They won't be in fortified positions. And they won't have civilians as shields.

If the US manages to spread the war into Poland and Belarus and Moldova, a few hypersonic missiles from Russia will quench the enthusiasm of those NATO countries, and Russia will join with Belarus in an overwhelming punishment of Poles and Baltics. If Kaliningrad is touched, the attackers will lose their capitals and HQs.

What the Russian military has not done does not indicate what it cannot do. The GS has a means to accomplish the goal of demilitarization and they are employing it. Strategically, the SMO is very successful. Pulling out of Izyum and Lyman are blips that don't even factor in the military scheme of things. Pawns on the board.

As was expected, today, once the facts begun to stream in, the scale of failure of all those VSU "offensives" became clear. There are purely military reasons for that and hysterics from Petraeus and amount of Ukie trolls in every platform are best indicators. I speak about it today:

As much as I hate all those SitReps, I had to do one, especially when the details of VSU's encounter with formations of the 76th Pskov air assault division became known, VSU formations have been pulverized. Pay attention to an increasing number of civilian trucks used by VSU in lieu of APCs--tells you a lot. And yes, I didn't mention it in video but for lovers of tactical porn--on the 29th of September Dnepropetrovsk's SBU was blown to smithereens by 3M14s with 40 SBU and foreign Intel officers killed and other 30 counted as missing. Just saying...

UPDATE: some excellent videos from Russian war correspondents--you will not see this on UTube. Especially this--war reporting of first rate.  

Some Business To Be Addressed...

1. I'll start with that and will only stress that these are horrifying warriors because their motivation is higher than that of berserkers. Judge for yourself: 

One-tenth of the men in Russia volunteering for the conflict with Ukraine are doing so to escape their henpecking wives, the mayor of the coal-mining town of Vorkuta, Yaroslav Shaposhnikov, has claimed. “Around 10% of volunteers who go to the frontline are going there because their wives probably became accustomed to a decent life… and are nagging, nagging, and nagging,” Shaposhnikov said during an online panel discussion – ‘Open Vorkuta’. The official urged Russian women to provide a solid “rear” for their husbands and support them instead. Shaposhnikov, however, did not elaborate on what his 10% estimate was based on.

You don't want to meet those people on the battlefield because they are afraid of nothing, including death. I assume Russia assembles and trains those men into special crack formations which will deal with the remnants of VSU come the end of the year. Beware! LOL. 

Now to a more serious matter:

2. Somebody posted here the link to Alexander Rogers' superbly acerbic piece on this Liman affair. Here is the link, sadly Google Translate will not completely convey Roger's traditional sarcastic tone but still--worth reading. 

     Liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiimaaaaaaaan (in Russian)

Try to run it through translator. All Rogers' points are valid. 

3. Where would we have been without the military "expertise" of The National Interest. I am being sarcastic, of course. But this one is worth paying attention to because it may, in the end, reflect both desperation and delusions on part of America's military class. In the piece titled A Ceasefire Can Ensure Ukrainian Independence, David Pyne concludes: 

After the rigged referendums conducted by Kremlin-appointed leaders this week indicated that an overwhelming majority supported unification with Russia, Putin hosted a ceremony at the Kremlin this morning declaring all four Ukrainian oblasts a part of Russia. Annexing these territories will increase Russia’s population by approximately 6 million people and effectively mark the end of Russia’s so-called “special military operation,” which has been a war fought for limited objectives and with a fraction of its armed forces. But the start of a full-scale war against Ukraine after mobilization is likely to be even more destructive and could potentially include some of Russia’s powerful but not yet utilized unconventional weapons, with the objective being the total capitulation of Ukraine.

Ah, yes, of course referenda were "rigged"--by VSU indiscriminate shelling of civilians, atrocities committed by Ukie Nazis and their NATO "instructors" against women, children, old people. Right, it was "rigged" from the git go by effectively committing crimes against humanity against Russophone population in Ukraine but, due to Payne's having M.S in "national security studies" and being a former H.Q. staff officer, he doesn't bother himself with facts and consequences. Moreover, he comes up with this wowser:

Reports indicate that Putin’s partial mobilization will not be limited to 300,000 troops, as the Russian government has misleadingly claimed, but rather 1.2 million military reservists that will be used to overrun Ukraine in a planned winter offensive that could bring an end to the country’s independence by early next year.    

Of course, he merely gives the link, without elaboration on what those "reports" are, because they are directly from... Ukrainskaya Pravda, a tabloid propaganda rag of Kiev Regime, but Payne, following his "education" from the military system which loses all its wars, doesn't mind spreading obvious propaganda BS without even bothering himself with checking the reality, forget about getting acquainted with those mobilization plans of Russia which are openly available (much of them are, of course, classified) to conclude that "1.2 million" IS NOT a partial mobilization. In fact, if Payne has his "degree" in whatever security "studies" he could have, at least, educated himself with basic mobilization documents of Russian Federation such as: 

Федеральный закон от 26.02.1997 N 31-ФЗ (ред. от 14.07.2022) "О мобилизационной подготовке и мобилизации в Российской Федерации"

Translation:  Federal Law No. 31-FZ of February 26, 1997 (as amended on July 14, 2022) "On mobilization training and mobilization in the Russian Federation". 

And mind you, I am not even talking about simple mathematical fact that mobilization of 1.2 million people in Russia would have manifested itself on a scale much much larger (no, not 1.2 mil. divided by 300 thousand= 4 times, no) than what is happening right now, because mobilizing 1.2 million soldiers as opposed to 300,000 IS NOT 4 times larger, it is a different type and scale of mobilization, including what amounts to enlisted personnel in existing Armed Forces. But Payne, obviously, never studied those things for his degree and while serving in whatever the H.Q. he served in. 

After that, he describes "conditions" which may "preserve" 404 not understanding that we all long ago left the world of wishful thinking and PR and are into serious business of dismantling Pax America in which Ukraine is but one of the fronts of this titanic struggle and it is all about demolishing existing combined West whose elites, quoting Vladimir Putin, are satanic. Kiev regime is a homicidal Nazi org, supported by the US and US military, and now the US will have the stamp of enablers of Neo-Nazism and let it live with it. After all, main US Army "hero" and allegedly "tank genius" General Patton considered Russians to be subhumans and, I think, this tradition is being preserved. Frankly, I don't know why this rag by Dmitri Simes even exists--it is an Exhibit A of a complete intellectual collapse of whatever passes in the US for geopolitical views and it is a sorry spectacle. 

But I wanted to make you aware of that, and, judging by the other wave of Ukie bots spreading fake news and exhibiting their ever increasing butt-hurt, they should. Because today Constitutional Court of Russia approved signed documents on four obalsts joining Russia and in this teeny-weeny piece of news that all four oblasts will join Russia within administrative borders which existed since the moment of their creation--you know, in USSR (in Russian). But that is just legalistic mambo-jumbo. Liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiimaaaaaaan.   

If You Ever Wondered What...

... Konashenkov did in the previous life...  

Here is how it looked in the late 1960s in USSR;)))
 

Yeah, I know, I was there... If you want to know what this gigantic blockbuster in USSR was, here it is...

The Elusive Avengers

One of the greatest adventure movies ever made, and, yes, you will not find it in the West. Per soundtrack--one of the greatest ever...

Made A New Video...

About the whole shebang and how every desperate attempt is made to distract people's attention from huge events. As Larch stated succinctly: 

Krasny Liman is the micro, Putin's speech and actions are the macro. The irony is people think Krasny Liman is easy to understand so they dwell on it as emblematic of the big picture, while Sept. 30 will remain for centuries as the Big Shift in geopolitical events. The war against Satan. Epic. Biblical. Colossal. Terrific monologue and primer for all to reexamine the Putin speech.  

So, here is me:

In related news--real Russian cultural elite sings to 180,000 people in Moscow yesterday.

 

I cannot emphasize enough the significance of all that and the way Russia cuts last feeble threads to 1990s and modern West.