Tuesday, October 04, 2022

Today's News: Playing nuclear chicken?

Well, this is terrifying, isn't it? It sounds like Russia is getting set to try to play a game of Nuclear Chicken with Ukraine and the west: Oh, I really hope the Telegraph is wrong and these guys are right: Given how poorly they have done everything else in this war, if Russia does try to play nuclear chicken with the West then it likely won't work out very well for Russia. But as Ukraine wins back more and more of its territory, Putin will be increasingly desperate: Canada's decision to support NATO membership for Ukraine surprised me, because in the past it seemed that NATO had always backed away from provoking Putin too much. 
But maybe now the West is realizing that mollifying Putin is no longer an option so so we might as well take it to him: Fukuyama is making a prediction: This was true yesterday, but may no longer be true now: Elon Musk, of course, is popping in to promote the stupid "Putin needs an off-ramp" idea. 
Christ, what an asshole! Zelenskyy tweets back, and Musk responds: And by the way, here's something nobody remembered -- the Washington Post reported in April that actually, the US government also paid millions for Starlink terminals for Ukraine. 

Here's a tweet that just applies so well to Musk: In news about the war itself, Ukraine continues to advance quickly -- Markos describes how they do it so much better than the Russians did:
The Russian approach to taking a city is to lay waste to it with artillery, then send cannon fodder ahead in “reconnaissance by fire.” If defenses remain, sure you lose some cheap infantry, but artillery has a better idea of where those defenses remain and it opens up again. Rinse, lather, and repeat until no resistance remains.
...Ukraine does it differently. They avoid direct urban warfare, cutting off a town’s supply lines until just one road out is left. This forces Russia to abandon hardened defensive positions lest they remain trapped, a la Mariupol. Thing is, armor is not the best escape vehicle—it breaks down and is slow, using up a great deal of diesel that may already be in short supply. So it’s easier to abandon the heavy stuff, steal some civilian vehicles, and hightail it out of dodge at top speed. Ukrainian artillery can target those roads, and many won’t make it out, but many do. End result, towns like Lyman are liberated with very little damage to their infrastructure. Not only does this encircle-and-starve-out approach save Ukrainian lives, but it moves the front much faster than Russia’s wasteful rinse-lather-repeat approach.
And here’s the bonus—Ukraine doesn’t even need to stick around for a town to surrender. It can leave a blocking force behind to pin down the Russian garrison as the spearhead races ahead.
Markos goes on to write about the misery that is now the Russian army, and how the mobilization is a disaster. Along with some horrific stories of how the new recruits are treated, he includes these tweets: I also saw this tweet today -- wouldn't this just shatter the world, if China decides to risk invading Taiwan while North America and Europe are focused on Ukraine: Moving on to other news, here's a story I couldn't resist: I have a feeling that Poilievre isn't going to be duplicating this any time soon.  
I just looked it up and Trudeau at 50 is actually 7 years older than Poilievre. But with Trudeau's recent haircut, the blue jeans photos when touring the Maritimes, the videos of singing in London plus the crowd cheering at his London hotel, and now the bungee jump, he's coming off as more youthful. On purpose, ya think?
 
Finally, this is really priceless:
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