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3 missile scientists arrested in Russia. This kind of things always happening there and shows the dysfunction of the Russian military machine. They are becoming more of a closed society - feel really bad for the citizens there and what Putin has done to lives there.
“We simply don’t understand how to continue our craft,” the scientists wrote.
The institute said its members Anatoly Maslov, Alexander Shiplyuk and Valery Zvegintsev are held in custody on treason charges for speaking at conferences abroad, publishing articles in popular magazines and participating in international projects.
Maslow and Shiplyuk were known to have been arrested in the summer of 2022.
Zvegintsev’s arrest has not been previously reported. He is identified as the founder of a laboratory that deals with hypersonic technology.
Siberian media has reported that a Novosibirsk court ruled to place Zvegintsev in pre-trial detention on April 7.
How can anyone trust anything that either side reports? Western media are known liars, and Russian media is nothing more than state run propaganda.
I literally have no idea what is going on, nor do I know who to trust.
Actually, the organized news services, like Reuters and AP, are not lying. But they are only as good as their sources. Obviously, the Ukrainian govt says one thing and the Russian govt says something else. Reuters will report what those governments say, but not necessarily fact check for you. I think you have to ask yourself if so-and-so has a motive to lie. If the answer is yes, you can then assume they are lying.
Wagner doesn’t only get paid with money, they also get a cut of assets they secure or take, like oil/gas wells in Syria, mineral mines or rights in Africa, etc.
Billions in revenue for the Wagner web of companies.
Quote:
How Russia's Wagner Group funds its role in Putin's Ukraine war by plundering Africa's resources
“Wagner is not here to defend the country," Usman scoffed as soon as he met us. "Whoever told you that, it's a lie!"
His family used to be in the gold dealing business, which is a big one in CAR.
"It was very prosperous," he said. "It paid for the education of all the children in our family and gave us a good life. We lacked nothing."
Then in 2021, Wagner came to his family's small-scale, artisanal mining town. Usman told us that his younger brother was killed, his sisters were raped and their gold business was seized by the Russians.
Usman said he was carted off to a makeshift prison cell at the Wagner forces' base, where he was tortured for days and tied up in a bag with a rope. He claims he eventually escaped and that he's been in hiding ever since.
"What they did to my country, seeing my parents… As a man it makes you feel useless," Usman said, breaking down weeping as he spoke with us. "They stole our possessions, burnt down our home… I even see Wagner soldiers riding on my motorbike with my name still on it."
He paints a painful, poignant image, which encapsulates the extent to which the Russian mercenaries have taken everything from one of the poorest countries in the world.
"Early in life I noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired hailed as heroes of imaginary victories; and I saw newspapers in London retailing these lies and eager intellectuals building emotional superstructures over events that never happened. I saw, in fact, history being written not in terms of what happened but of what ought to have happened according to various “party lines.” - George Orwell
One of the seeming paradoxes of the Russian President is the degree to which he is at once a unitary micromanager and an absent, aloof, and often indecisive leader.
Most years, Vladimir Putin delivers an annual address to the Federal Assembly. It was during this speech, in 2021, with a hundred thousand Russian troops already amassed on the border with Ukraine, that he said anyone who threatened Russia’s security interests “will regret their deeds more than they have regretted anything in a long time.”
But by the end of 2022, nearly a year into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Putin broke protocol; December, then January, came and went without an appearance from the Russian President...
One of the seeming paradoxes of the Putin system is the degree to which its figurehead is at once a unitary micromanager and an absent, aloof, and often indecisive leader...
Stanovaya sees the situation as a “vacuum of political will.” The fundamental cause of this, she said, is that Putin has nothing to propose at the moment. He genuinely believes that Russia is essentially a finished political project—the internal enemies are vanquished, the economy is under state control, the country has been reoriented around a long-term struggle with the West—and it now needs only to sit back and await its spoils. Over time, Putin presumes, fissures will emerge in the Western coalition, decreasing support for Ukraine, and Ukraine itself will fracture, with President Volodymyr Zelensky losing popularity and the public, tired of the war, calling for peace. “In Putin’s vision,” Stanovaya said, “external circumstances will change, and Russia will have the chance to correct the situation in its favor.”
In this version of events, she went on, Putin sees himself not as weak but sagacious and pragmatic, avoiding being pulled into an unplanned escalation while playing for time. “The problem is that this doesn’t look convincing, neither for the élite nor the country writ large,” Stanovaya said. With time, the demand for action will grow, she told me, and could rise to the surface as a result of some unforeseen circumstance or crisis, whether on the battlefield in Ukraine or back in Russia. “Everyone is looking to the Kremlin and waiting for some plans, explanations, movements,” she said. “And then nothing happens.”
They're not $100 million. I couldn't find the exact price, but this article says, "A Kh-47 Kinzhal hypersonic missile can cost US$10 million and above". And that a Kalibr cruise missile costs $6.5 million.
"The most modern Tomahawk missile in the Block V version in the U.S. Army costs $2 mln per unit in the 2022 fiscal year. Publicly available documents from the U.S. Marine Corps says just that.
With that in mind, a Kalibr may cost $6.5 mln only in conditions of astronomical corruption inside the Russian ministry of defense which is of course cannot be ruled out, but not enough reason to multiply the price tag by several times.
We should also consider that the Tomahawk’s cost of production is significantly higher than that one of a Kalibr. Now, as we keep all that in mind, we can cautiously assume that one such missile costs Russian Navy about $1 mln at most, or even less. In Russia, local media usually stick to $300,000 or $350,000."
"Analysts believe that the Kinzhal is derived from the ground-launched 9K720 Iskander-M short-range ballistic missile. Both weapons achieve hypersonic speeds through a “quasi-ballistic,” unpredictable flight trajectory without departing the atmosphere. The primary difference between the Kinzhal and its purported predecessor is that the Kinzhal is launched by an airborne vehicle rather than from the ground, making it less predictable, harder to intercept, and potentially more survivable than the Iskander ground system."
Russia has not released the cost of the Kinzhal. But from what I can tell, it is just a modified Iskander ballistic missile launched from a jet. Forbes claims an Iskander costs $3 million. The article above claims it is more like $2 million. Which makes me wonder how these numbers are affected by exchange rates and purchasing power parity.
To be fair, it isn't clear to me how many hypersonics were actually launched at Ukraine. There are conflicting reports and lack of reliable video. Whereas there is video of how many Patriots were fired in a 2-minute span.
The cost of the patriot missiles were far greater than the cost of the Russian missiles even if we use the fake prices Ukraine claims. If we use real prices, the difference is even greater. Plus part of the Patriot system was damaged.
Yeah, a single Patriot missile is 3-4 mil, and the system is a cool 1 billion.
- Is this the path that I chose?
- Why are the lives of some people more important than others?
- And who decides that?
- Being a hero means to endure.
- But enduring, it doesn't mean to just pointlessly tolerate, does it?
- The best way to prevent a prisoner from escaping is to make it so that he doesn't even know he is in a prison
- We easily succumb to lies
- However we do know what our world is, what our reality is that we live in.
- And the reality that we talk about in whispers.
- I do not believe in a revolution
- True life occurs where inconspicuous changes are made within people's souls
- Inconspicuous for my country, but not for me
- I will live a truthful life, this is my Russia
- It will always be my Russia
- I will endure
- My family will endure
- We live a worthy life, thanks to my actions
“People that surround you may not want to hear the truth"
"But we do"
“You aren’t powerless”
"'Contact us via a safe method"
Russia is probably in the midst of an industrial collapse.
Russian authorities limit data, so it's been hard to analyze. But that's what AI is for. AI can look at data and make a judgement that you never thought of.
In this case, AI shows pollution in Russia has dropped 6.2% under last year. That can only mean one thing - Industrial decline.
But it's not just air pollution that shows what is happening in Russia. The European Central Bank has methods of analyzing business activity and real estate transactions and their data shows the same thing. Business activity is now approaching the levels seen during the worst of the Covid crisis
This news is expected and welcome to the proponents of sanctions. The sanctions are biting Russia and biting hard. If they are kept on long enough they will destroy the Russian economy. And, of course, if the Russian economy dies, so does Wagner.
One of the seeming paradoxes of the Russian President is the degree to which he is at once a unitary micromanager and an absent, aloof, and often indecisive leader.
Most years, Vladimir Putin delivers an annual address to the Federal Assembly. It was during this speech, in 2021, with a hundred thousand Russian troops already amassed on the border with Ukraine, that he said anyone who threatened Russia’s security interests “will regret their deeds more than they have regretted anything in a long time.”
But by the end of 2022, nearly a year into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Putin broke protocol; December, then January, came and went without an appearance from the Russian President...
One of the seeming paradoxes of the Putin system is the degree to which its figurehead is at once a unitary micromanager and an absent, aloof, and often indecisive leader...
Stanovaya sees the situation as a “vacuum of political will.” The fundamental cause of this, she said, is that Putin has nothing to propose at the moment. He genuinely believes that Russia is essentially a finished political project—the internal enemies are vanquished, the economy is under state control, the country has been reoriented around a long-term struggle with the West—and it now needs only to sit back and await its spoils. Over time, Putin presumes, fissures will emerge in the Western coalition, decreasing support for Ukraine, and Ukraine itself will fracture, with President Volodymyr Zelensky losing popularity and the public, tired of the war, calling for peace. “In Putin’s vision,” Stanovaya said, “external circumstances will change, and Russia will have the chance to correct the situation in its favor.”
In this version of events, she went on, Putin sees himself not as weak but sagacious and pragmatic, avoiding being pulled into an unplanned escalation while playing for time. “The problem is that this doesn’t look convincing, neither for the élite nor the country writ large,” Stanovaya said. With time, the demand for action will grow, she told me, and could rise to the surface as a result of some unforeseen circumstance or crisis, whether on the battlefield in Ukraine or back in Russia. “Everyone is looking to the Kremlin and waiting for some plans, explanations, movements,” she said. “And then nothing happens.”
The Russians will remain dangerous for decades to come. And they are hardy people willing to tolerate immense hardships. Ukrainians are no different. The EU needs the Ukrainians in their fold to defend against the Russians. Ironically, if Putin didn't treat the Ukrainians like unloved step child but instead gave them the vision to share the world with them, perhaps they would have remained with Russia. So in the end, the kleptocratic despot has noone to blame except himself for Russian decline.
Wagner doesn’t only get paid with money, they also get a cut of assets they secure or take, like oil/gas wells in Syria, mineral mines or rights in Africa, etc.
Billions in revenue for the Wagner web of companies.
That's right. Prigozhin is not just a military commander ( or rather owner of the military group) - he is a businessman big time, with a lot of ties/connections in Russian business world I'm sure.
He is ruthless yet well-spoken.
And that's why I already pointed out early in the game, that he is not just the *military commander,* he is a politician as well and he positions himself as such, which makes a lot of Russians wonder what this is all about.
That's why it becomes a growing question, what comes after Putin's government, the way it was set to operate so far, with people in charge, that Putin appoints and trusts.
Last edited by erasure; 05-17-2023 at 01:39 PM..
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