(The Mariupol Peace Bell. Click here for more.)
Just a quick note before we get started. Since the site is behaving funky, especially when tweets are embedded, I’m going to link to tweets rather than embed them in the post. With the exception of a few that have video that I think needs to be highlighted and seen, as well as one or two others that don’t. I will insert the images from some of the tweets I link to with attribution back to the tweet I got it from. The plan is to keep the post as tweet free as possible to minimize problems with the site and the post loading.
I want to start tonight with two items for analysis. Both are follow ups from last night’s post. Last night I wrote about how some commenters and analysts, both with and without national security experience, were taking President’s Zelenskyy’s statement about Ukraine not joining NATO as a sign that he was providing a face saving way out for Putin in negotiations between the Ukrainians and the Russians. I argued that this was most likely not the case. Shortly after today’s round of negotiations between the Ukrainians and the Russians was concluded, The Financial Times reported that Ukraine and Russia had created a preliminary fifteen point draft of a peace plan that included Ukraine remaining neutral once the war concludes. This was immediately amplified by ABC’s Moscow correspondent on his twitter feed. From there it was picked up and led to many of the folks I was referring to in yesterday’s update highlighting it as confirmation that their predictions and analysis were in fact correct.
Their predictions and analysis were in fact NOT CORRECT!!!!
I’m putting the jump in early, more after it!
Eight hours later, President Zelenskyy’s senior staff set everyone straight.
Briefly. FT published a draft, which represents the requesting position of the Russian side. Nothing more. The ?? side has its own positions. The only thing we confirm at this stage is a ceasefire, withdrawal of Russian troops and security guarantees from a number of countries
— Михайло Подоляк (@Podolyak_M) March 16, 2022
All Ukraine wants from Russia at this point is to negotiate a ceasefire, which will stop the fighting, get Russian troops off of Ukrainian soil, and then it wants firm, binding security guarantees from “a number of countries”. You can read number of countries as the US, the UK, and the EU member states. Russia is doing what Russia always does. It is using the negotiations to drag things out diplomatically to make itself look like it is operating in good faith, when it, in fact, has no actual intention to stop whatever it is doing that has led to the call for it to negotiate.
How do we know the Russians have no intention of stopping? We know because while everyone was retweeting the ABC reporter’s thread as evidence that they were right about President’s Zelenskyy’s comments about not joining NATO, Russia was dropping a thousand pounder on Mariupol’s Drama House, which was serving as a shelter for between 1,000 and 1,200 residents of the city who had had their homes destroyed. Why had they had their homes destroyed you ask? The Russians blowed them up real good, which drove them to centralized shelters where they could be targeted even more easily.
Here’s the before and after pictures, which were tweeted out by Ukraine’s Foreign Minister:
The Russians knew damn well what they were targeting! And the reason I know the Russians knew exactly what they were targeting is because the citizens of Mariupol had marked the ground with the Russian word for children in front of and behind the Drama House. Asami Terajima of The Kyiv Independent tweeted out this image showing the markings:
Here’s the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on the bombing:
But wait, there’s more! A couple of hours later the Russians dropped another bomb, also most likely a thousand pounder, on the Neptune Pool in Mariupol. Which, like the Drama House, was being used as a shelter for citizens of Mariupol driven from their homes because the Russians had previously targeted and destroyed those houses and apartment buildings. Video of the aftermath in the tweet below:
Russian invaders in Mariupol (Donetsk Oblast) fired on the premises of the pool "Neptune". This building was used as a shelter for pregnant women and women with children. The number of victims is currently unknown pic.twitter.com/lk8i0VjzLH
— Hromadske Int. (@Hromadske) March 16, 2022
What else were the Russians doing today while not negotiating in good faith? They were pulling forces out of their illegally seized territories in Georgia and sending them to Ukraine!
Confirmed: Russian units from the 4th Guards occupation base in Tskhinvali are leaving the region through the Roki tunnel and heading to fight in Ukraine. In addition to Russia's 58th Army units, volunteers from the so-called South Ossetia are reportedly also leaving for Ukraine. https://t.co/mcKtpE79yQ pic.twitter.com/tybMpUdhXN
— Visioner (@visionergeo) March 16, 2022
There’s video embedded in each of the subsequent tweets, so click across if you want to see them. Here’s what the rest of the thread says:
- Russian units from the 58th Army based in so-called South Ossetia reportedly left the region for Ukraine. However, the direction of movements is unclear.
- “Our guys are sent to Ukraine to finish off the Nazis who are terrorizing their people,” – Eduard Kokoity, the former de facto President of “South Ossetia” wrote on his Telegram channel.
- A Russian military convoy from Tskhinvali Region was spotted on the Transcaucasian highway near Alagir.
- More footage of Tskhinvali-based Russian military column.
Putin and Russia are not negotiating in good faith. They never do. Zelenskyy and Ukraine are not trying to come up with a face saving way for Putin to get out of the predicament he’s gotten himself into. Don’t fall for this!
But wait, there’s even more! Putin decided to give a short televised address that everyone seems to think is an indicator that he’s lost the plot. I found a version where a native Russian speaker who speaks English added English subtitles:
I have translated and added subtitles to the latest video speech by Vladimir Putin from two hours ago. Please don’t let it go in vain – I want everyone to see what a speech of true fascism looks like.
No further comment needed, it’s all here, in his speech pic.twitter.com/QEzsG9BODX
— Michael Elgort ?❤️???✡️ (@just_whatever) March 16, 2022
My take is that he was yanking the chains of the oligarchs. Nevzlin renounced his Russian citizenship a couple of days ago as he fled to Israel. Abramovich is in the wind. He was last seen in the VIP lounge of the private jet portion of Ben Gurion airport. I’ve heard squat about Blavatsky, but he and his entire family live in the US and have American citizenship. Firtash is still under house arrest in Vienna. Deripaska made a distancing statement last week, as did Fridman. Progozhin is completely silent, but Wagner is in Ukraine fighting with Russian military forces, so that answers that question. He’s reminding these people of who protects them and they all know what happens if he stops extending that protection to them. Additionally, he hit the dog howls that needed to be referenced for his propagandize citizenry. A lot of the oligarchs are at least nominally Jewish or of partial Jewish descent. Most all the ones I referenced above are. So using the language of cosmopolitanism, which was first used as an anti-Semitic slur by Stalin, makes sure that everyone knows who he’s talking about. You’ll also have noted he hit the anti-LGBTQ+ theme pretty hard too!
The second thing I want to touch on is a question asked last night in the comments by oldster:
What is your answer to the argument that Biden’s greatest obligation is to avoid WWI and WWIII, ie either a Guns of August scenario or a full-on nuclear exchange?
I don’t know if that is his greatest obligation, but I think that is certainly the strategic space, if you will, that he is trying to safely navigate through.
On to the update part of the update. We know how Mariupol is doing as I put it up top, so we’ve covered that.
This morning (US time) President Zelenskyy addressed a joint session of Congress via video. Congresswoman Taylor Greene, fresh off of a series of thoroughly anti-American, anti-NATO, anti-Ukrainian, and anti-Semitic tweets last night, refused to stand and clap when he was introduced. Senator Manchin was fiddling with his iPad all the way through the speech. Classy!
The address went well and seems to have been well received by almost everyone. The usual suspects – Republican senators and members of Congress who voted against the aid package for Ukraine last week – spent the rest of the day banging the drum for the Biden administration to get it in gear and help Ukraine. Senator Blackburn, bless her heart.
We have confirmation that the US is sending Switchblade drones to Ukraine. And that Britain has already sent Starstreak air defense systems.
LONDON, March 16 (Reuters) – Britain is supplying starstreak anti-aircraft missiles to Ukraine, defence minister Ben Wallace told the BBC on Wednesday.
“We are supplying them – they will go into theatre,” the BBC quoted Wallace as saying.
Here’s everything the US is sending:
The new U.S. aid includes 800 anti-aircraft systems, including longer-range platforms; 9,000 shoulder-mounted anti-armor missiles to destroy tanks and vehicles; 7,000 machine guns, shotguns, and grenade launchers; and 20 million rounds of ammunition. The latest shipment will also include drones, demonstrating that America is willing to send its “most cutting-edge equipment” to Ukraine, Biden said.
Biden promised to send even more arms and impose more sanctions to cripple the Russian economy and isolate Moscow from the world.
“That’s our goal: make Putin pay the price, weaken his position while strengthening the hand of Ukrainians on the battlefield and at the negotiating table,” he said.
Obligatory:
Ukraine is now on the EU’s energy grid.
Last night, after I put the post up, the Ukrainians hit Russian ground and air assets at the Russian occupied Kherson Airport.
The Melitopol mayor was freed. However, the Russians are scarfing up a lot of other people in the areas of Ukraine that they occupy. Including paramedics.
Here’s Mayor Klitschko rhetorically knocking a reporter out!
One of the all-time greatest interviews. pic.twitter.com/D7HqCeDNdy
— Philip Crowther (@PhilipinDC) March 16, 2022
Your daily bayraktar!
Some good news: Bayraktar the dog has a new home. Animal Rescue Kharkiv found him wandering the streets wounded. They took him in and gave him medical care & named him after the drone. Now they tell me he's been adopted by Julia, who recently lost a beloved shepherd. Happy boy. pic.twitter.com/JTYEgFeVeV
— Adam Rawnsley (@arawnsley) March 16, 2022
Who is the best Bayraktar? You are!!!!
Finally, here’s four items for you all to read.
The first is a deep dive by Buzzfeed into how Roman Abramovich has been hiding and laundering his dirty money.
Between 2001 and 2016, a secretive network of 10 offshore companies plunged a whopping $1.3 billion into American investment firms and hedge funds.
The money, sent through the high-secrecy jurisdictions of the British Virgin Islands and Cyprus, was difficult to trace. But with the help of confidential banking records, investigators at State Street, one of America’s oldest banks, stumbled upon the identity of the mystery investor: Roman Abramovich, the oligarch famous for his ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The investigators reported Abramovich’s investment network in a series of “suspicious activity reports” to the US Treasury Department in 2015 and 2016.
They pointed to court records showing that Abramovich had made “substantial cash payments” in Russia for “political patronage and influence.” And they detailed how the corporate structures of the companies holding the $1.3 billion had frequently changed, which they said could be an attempt to “conceal ownership.”
During the next six years, the US government took no action against Abramovich, and the State Street investigation stayed secret.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, Western governments have moved to clamp down on oligarchs with ties to the Kremlin. Last week the United Kingdom sanctioned Abramovich, citing his “close relationship” with Putin and saying that materials from a steel company he controls may have been used to build Russian tanks. The UK froze his assets in the country, including several mansions and the Premier League soccer team Chelsea Football Club.
The US has not made any moves against Abramovich — but that may soon change, a US official told BuzzFeed News. Abramovich is under scrutiny by a new Justice Department–led task force called KleptoCapture, which aims to identify the wealth and freeze the assets of oligarchs who have aided Putin, the official said.
How much of Abramovich’s money made its way into the United States has never been publicly disclosed. The State Street investigation shows that Abramovich had invested as much as 10% of his estimated wealth into funds managed by American financiers.
Much, much, much more at the link.
Here’s an assessment from RUSI explaining why the Ukrainians need to pull their forces out of southern and eastern Ukraine before the bulk of the Ukrainian Army is encircled and cut off. Not sure I’d have had the Seapower subject matter expert be one of the authors…
The war in Ukraine has been dominated by an effective and far-reaching information campaign led by the Ukrainian state. The Ukrainian narrative is dominating both the news and social media cycles, which are now of equal importance in forming public opinion. The narrative is littered with broken Russian convoys, farmers triumphantly towing boutique Russian air defence systems away from their hiding places, and harrowing footage of Russian tank formations being destroyed. And yet, by analysing three maps depicting the operational picture, including one released by the UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) and two curated by open-source investigators – the Twitter account Jomini of the West and Konrad Muzyka’s Ukraine Conflict Monitor – it is apparent that Russian forces are making progress.
However, an exclusive focus on cities – though understandable – may obscure more than it reveals. Though it seems clear that the initial Russian plan was based around a swift coup de main against Kyiv while the bulk of the Ukrainian army was pinned in the east opposite Donetsk and Luhansk, this is unlikely to remain the case. Even under best-case assumptions (from a Russian perspective), it is unlikely that Kyiv will be taken soon. However, it is worth considering that there is a second Ukrainian centre of gravity – alluded to by Vladimir Putin in his pledge to ‘demilitarise’ Ukraine – the regular Ukrainian army, most of which remains near Donetsk and Luhansk under the aegis of the Joint Forces Operation (JFO).
The position of this force is looking increasingly precarious as Russian forces advance to encircle it on three axes. Russian forces of the 58th Combined Arms Army and 22nd Army, pushing north from Crimea, have commenced assaults on Beryslav along the Dnieper, and appear likely to link up at Polohy with Russian separatist forces and the Eighth Combined Arms Army advancing from Donbas. Elements of the First Guards Tank Army and Sixth Combined Arms Army advancing past Kharkiv also appear to have largely eschewed attempts to take the city – focusing instead on reducing it with artillery while bypassing it as they advance south and west past Poltava, cutting the JFO off from escaping northwards. Finally, in the southwest, Russian forces of the 20th Guards Motor Rifle Division appear similarly intent on bypassing Mykolaiv but, notably, may not be advancing on Odessa. Instead, they appear to be advancing north, which could suggest a desire to seize the western banks of key crossing points over the Dnieper.
Viewed in conjunction, these advances present a troubling picture whereby the Ukrainian forces opposite Donetsk and Luhansk are at risk of encirclement on the eastern side of the Dnieper. If this is indeed the focus of Russia’s approach, then the emphasis on Russia’s ability to take major cities as a metric of success will have been an analytical error, as Russia appears more intent on pinning Ukrainian forces in cities like Kharkiv while it bypasses them. Indeed, preparations for an amphibious assault on Odessa may have been a feint, given that the ground forces such an assault could have linked up with appear to be moving north.
Much more at the link above. This is, I think, important to keep in mind especially given the much more positive estimates that the US Department of Defense and the British Ministry of Defense keep making about what is going on in Ukraine.
New York’s Intelligencer published a series of war diaries, for lack of a better term, from sixteen Ukrainians born after Ukrainian independence.
February 23
Russian forces surround Ukraine on three sides. The U.S. warns that an invasion is imminent. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy declares a state of emergency.
Aleksey, 26, a printing manager in Kyiv
I was standing with my friend on the Yurkovytsia Mountain, which overlooks the whole city, and we joked, “Just imagine — bombs are going to fall on Kyiv.”
Viktoriia Khutorna, 24, a television journalist in Kyiv
In the middle of the day, I texted my English teacher. We were supposed to meet, and she said, “I’m sorry. I totally forgot about our lesson.” She had decided to leave Ukraine at the last minute and was on her way to the airport. I said, “Why didn’t you tell me before? I might have planned something else.” So now I had a free evening and nothing to do with it.
I try to stay out of politics. Ever since 2014, when I was worried about my mom, who protested in Maidan Square, I decided not to be involved or to constantly watch the news because it was traumatizing to follow the news and not know what’s happening to my relatives.
Later, I was on the phone with my mother and told her I had a bad feeling. She said, “Don’t worry. It’s crazy to invade Ukraine fully — especially Kyiv.”
I said maybe I should leave for a couple of days. But then I thought, I don’t really have money. So I spent some time watching Inventing Anna on Netflix and learning some English by myself.Petro Chekal, 20, a student in Kharkiv
On the TV at 5 a.m., Putin announced the beginning of the military operation, just — war. Here is Mitya, my brother, listening. This is a Russian TV channel, and they said it was a rescue mission. My grandparents watch Russian TV all the time, and for the first few days, they couldn’t believe it. And when they finally did believe it, they switched to Ukrainian TV.
Leonid, 19, and Nasta, 21, siblings and sociology students in Kyiv
Leonid: I was anticipating a new video game that was supposed to be released the following day. But I had been sensing that something was going to happen. Two or three weeks prior, there were Russian troops building up along the border and people had started to prepare for the worst. I rarely remember my dreams, but one of those nights, I woke up and told Nasta that I dreamt the war had started.
Nasta: It had such a profound effect on me that I did not sleep for the next two hours, although Leonid fell back asleep almost instantly. But on the 23rd, we both thought we’d have at least two or three more days to prepare.
Daria Holovatenko, 18, a university student in Avdiivka
That day, I was hanging out with a friend at my parents’ café, talking about going to America as part of a work program for students. I really want to visit Los Angeles, maybe work as a hotel receptionist to improve my language skills and learn about the culture. I also got a message from my professor, who suggested I take part in a Chinese-language competition whose winner would go to China. I was so happy to have been chosen.
We saw on the news that Ukraine was declaring a state of emergency and the American warning. Even so, I didn’t think the war was going to happen. None of us believed an invasion was imminent.
Danyil Zadorozhnyi, 26, a poet and journalist in Lviv
My partner, Yulya, and I watched President Zelenskyy make his speech to the Russians that night. I liked it a lot — clear, focused. I thought Putin was bluffing because an invasion seemed stupid. Extremely stupid.
Mariia Shuvalova, 28, a Ph.D. candidate in Kyiv
Very late at night, I got an alert that probably Russia would invade. I was shocked, and I started charging my laptop and power bank but then I thought, No, that is impossible. It’s dumb. It’s just crazy shit. And I went to sleep.
A whole lot more at the link!
And fourth, and finally, The Wall Street Journal takes a deep dive into just how the Russian Army has gotten bogged down in Ukraine.
VOZNESENSK, Ukraine—A Kalashnikov rifle slung over his shoulder, Voznesensk’s funeral director, Mykhailo Sokurenko, spent this Tuesday driving through fields and forests, picking up dead Russian soldiers and taking them to a freezer railway car piled with Russian bodies—the casualties of one of the most comprehensive routs President Vladimir Putin’s forces have suffered since he ordered the invasion of Ukraine.
A rapid Russian advance into the strategic southern town of 35,000 people, a gateway to a Ukrainian nuclear power station and pathway to attack Odessa from the back, would have showcased the Russian military’s abilities and severed Ukraine’s key communications lines.
More at the link.
Open thread!
War for Ukraine Update 22: Putin Ups the Ante On Committing War CrimesPost + Comments (133)