The Invasion of Ukraine

[headshot]

Remember when Russia destroyed a commercial passenger airliner over Ukraine, hundreds died and the world just looked on with mild bemusement?

[TopBadger]

To be fair though... back in those prior times the world didn't know Russia's military was a paper tiger. It's easy to say knowing what we know now that the US/UN/NATO could have been more physically assertive in it's response to these things.

[Woodchopper]

Missed this earlier.

Poll commissioned by CNN suggests that a majority of the US electorate:
- disapprove of Biden's handling of Russia and Ukraine
- believe that the US has done enough for Ukraine
- believe that Congress should not authorize additional funding.
- are worried that the war in Ukraine will lead to a broader war in Europe, Russian attacks elsewhere, or other threats against US national security.

While only a minority support providing weapons (though a majority supports providing intelligence and training).

This appears to be a dramatic reversal of previous sentiment. So its important to see if the result is replicated. If so it seems to me that the explanation isn't due to anything happening in UKraine or Russia etc, but because support for Ukraine has become a partisan issue with some high profile Republicans opposed, and then much of the electorate falls in line.

If these results are replicated expect it to be harder to get a majority vote in congress for more military aid.

Link to survey: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents ... raine-poll
Link to CNN article: https://edition.cnn.com/2023/08/04/poli ... index.html

Particularly offensive example by the Heritage Foundation:
https://x.com/heritage/status/169401283 ... 1zY-PW4R9w

This is what Democrats will have to deal with.

Tried to add a screenshot but the file size was too big.

[Woodchopper]

Particularly offensive example by the Heritage Foundation:
https://x.com/heritage/status/169401283 ... 1zY-PW4R9w

This is what Democrats will have to deal with.

Tried to add a screenshot but the file size was too big.

Doubling down:

Until Joe Biden offers a plan to end the war in Ukraine, Congress shouldn’t approve another cent.

https://x.com/heritage/status/169411021 ... 1zY-PW4R9w

Expect a lot more like this.

[jimbob]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/musk-secr ... ips-report

Musk secretly ordered SpaceX engineers to switch off the Starlink satellite communications network near the coast of occupied Crimea in order to thwart a Ukrainian surprise attack on Russia’s naval fleet, according to a report. The incident last year is reported in Walter Isaacson’s upcoming biography of the billionaire titled Elon Musk. With the comms down, the Ukrainian submarine drones packed with explosives “lost connectivity and washed ashore harmlessly,” Isaacson writes, according to CNN. Musk was reportedly motivated to foil the attack out of concern that a strike on Crimea would constitute a “mini-Pearl Harbor” and lead to Russia retaliating with nuclear weapons. The SpaceX boss apparently began to question his decision to support Starlink being used for Kyiv’s military

[EACLucifer]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/musk-secr ... ips-report

Musk secretly ordered SpaceX engineers to switch off the Starlink satellite communications network near the coast of occupied Crimea in order to thwart a Ukrainian surprise attack on Russia’s naval fleet, according to a report. The incident last year is reported in Walter Isaacson’s upcoming biography of the billionaire titled Elon Musk. With the comms down, the Ukrainian submarine drones packed with explosives “lost connectivity and washed ashore harmlessly,” Isaacson writes, according to CNN. Musk was reportedly motivated to foil the attack out of concern that a strike on Crimea would constitute a “mini-Pearl Harbor” and lead to Russia retaliating with nuclear weapons. The SpaceX boss apparently began to question his decision to support Starlink being used for Kyiv’s military

We've known he was mainlining propaganda straight from Russia when he used the line "Kruschev's Mistake", something that you wouldn't expect your average English speaker to use, a bit like Mearsheimer's "Waif in his underwear" moment.

That f.cker has been talking to the enemy. He's allowed them to push him into sabotaging an important operation because he's paranoid and out of his depth. Acting against the Black Sea Fleet is vital for world food security. He should lose security clearance, have contracts routed through US Government so Defence Production Act can be used, and have all his business affairs thoroughly audited.

[jimbob]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/musk-secr ... ips-report

Musk secretly ordered SpaceX engineers to switch off the Starlink satellite communications network near the coast of occupied Crimea in order to thwart a Ukrainian surprise attack on Russia’s naval fleet, according to a report. The incident last year is reported in Walter Isaacson’s upcoming biography of the billionaire titled Elon Musk. With the comms down, the Ukrainian submarine drones packed with explosives “lost connectivity and washed ashore harmlessly,” Isaacson writes, according to CNN. Musk was reportedly motivated to foil the attack out of concern that a strike on Crimea would constitute a “mini-Pearl Harbor” and lead to Russia retaliating with nuclear weapons. The SpaceX boss apparently began to question his decision to support Starlink being used for Kyiv’s military

We've known he was mainlining propaganda straight from Russia when he used the line "Kruschev's Mistake", something that you wouldn't expect your average English speaker to use, a bit like Mearsheimer's "Waif in his underwear" moment.

That f.cker has been talking to the enemy. He's allowed them to push him into sabotaging an important operation because he's paranoid and out of his depth. Acting against the Black Sea Fleet is vital for world food security. He should lose security clearance, have contracts routed through US Government so Defence Production Act can be used, and have all his business affairs thoroughly audited.

Absolutely

[EACLucifer]

SpaceX's statement is acting like they foiled the destruction of a major part of the Black Sea Fleet. This may be bombast, or simply bad interpretation - there's a f.cking reason software/satellite providers shouldn't be f.cking around with end-user level stuff and not understanding what's going on is a major part of it - but if it isn't, the blood that is on their hands for that decision

The Black Sea Fleet launches missiles that kill many Ukrainian civilians

The Black Sea Fleet launches missiles that have burned tens of thousands of tonnes of food in an attempt to use global hunger as a weapon

The Black Sea Fleet has blockaded the transport of millions of tonnes of food in an attempt to use global hunger as a weapon

They should be destroyed. It hurts to even contemplate the possibility that an opportunity was lost because of a stupid f.cking techbro's drug-addled paranoia and the influence of his rightwing hangers on.

And for the USA to allow such a moron to interfere with such an important operation is also indefensible. Should the SpaceX statement prove even remotely true, the USA should make up for it by way of supplying enough weapons to sink the f.cking Black Sea Fleet at anchor, whether in Russia or occupied Ukraine, and, ideally, to strap the racist-coddling bigot moron dipshit to one of the cruise missiles in the process.

[bjn]

That sounds entirely fair.

[jimbob]

Yup

[jimbob]

Musk has admitted this

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/169 ... 04146?s=20

@elonmusk
There was an emergency request from government authorities to activate Starlink all the way to Sevastopol.

The obvious intent being to sink most of the Russian fleet at anchor.

If I had agreed to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation.
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[IvanV]

Musk has admitted this

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/169 ... 04146?s=20

@elonmusk
There was an emergency request from government authorities to activate Starlink all the way to Sevastopol.

The obvious intent being to sink most of the Russian fleet at anchor.

If I had agreed to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation.

Unfortunate as the consequence is, that sounds like a reasonable objection. Given how direct his involvement would be, I can imagine Elon Musk might have reasonable worries about falling out of a window or have his private jet explode.

But I also think that is in part his own fault for having created the situation where he is so directly and personally responsible for the military capability of Ukraine, rather than just being like a generic supplier of food, electrical wires, or generic telecommunications services, to Ukraine. If geofencing Starklink had never been brought up, for example, and there was more normal corporate governance.

[TopBadger]

In meddling Musk has picked a side, and it's the wrong one.

[Woodchopper]

But I also think that is in part his own fault for having created the situation where he is so directly and personally responsible for the military capability of Ukraine, rather than just being like a generic supplier of food, electrical wires, or generic telecommunications services, to Ukraine. If geofencing Starklink had never been brought up, for example, and there was more normal corporate governance.

Geofencing Starlink has always been necessary to stop the Russians using it. There are retail sales of the terminals all around the world so it wouldn’t be difficult for the Russians to get hold of some.

[Woodchopper]

SpaceX's statement is acting like they foiled the destruction of a major part of the Black Sea Fleet. This may be bombast, or simply bad interpretation -

Probably bombast. It looks like the Ukrainians quickly adapted their sea drones to be able to use different technology and made subsequent attacks.

[dyqik]

But I also think that is in part his own fault for having created the situation where he is so directly and personally responsible for the military capability of Ukraine, rather than just being like a generic supplier of food, electrical wires, or generic telecommunications services, to Ukraine. If geofencing Starklink had never been brought up, for example, and there was more normal corporate governance.

Geofencing Starlink has always been necessary to stop the Russians using it. There are retail sales of the terminals all around the world so it wouldn’t be difficult for the Russians to get hold of some.

Geofencing it to non-Crimea Ukraine as a way to stop Russians using it implies that Russians have been able to use it in Ukraine.

If only there was such a thing as User IDs and passwords that could have different geofences applied.

[Woodchopper]

But I also think that is in part his own fault for having created the situation where he is so directly and personally responsible for the military capability of Ukraine, rather than just being like a generic supplier of food, electrical wires, or generic telecommunications services, to Ukraine. If geofencing Starklink had never been brought up, for example, and there was more normal corporate governance.

Geofencing Starlink has always been necessary to stop the Russians using it. There are retail sales of the terminals all around the world so it wouldn’t be difficult for the Russians to get hold of some.

Geofencing it to non-Crimea Ukraine as a way to stop Russians using it implies that Russians have been able to use it in Ukraine.

If only there was such a thing as User IDs and passwords that could have different geofences applied.

I assume that blocking via ID would have been feasible if the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence were the customer. However Starlink terminals were being bought by all sorts of organisations around the world and shipped to Ukraine where they were donated to military units and used by civilians as well. Difficult to ensure in those circumstances that the company is allowing or blocking access to the correct terminal.

[dyqik]

All you have to do is to issue user ID and passwords to the Ukrainian defence ministry and let them distribute them for use on the donated terminals. Same as they would any code book/communications credentials, etc.

The hardware is a separate thing to the user credentials.

[EACLucifer]

Can't verify source,mbut it's claimed this happened during tonight's attack on occupied Sevastopol.



For context, Ukraine launched a major attack and appear to have destroyed a landing ship and possibly a submarine as well as potentially other targets, right where that outage is claimed. There's enoug misinfo out there right now, though, that I'd appreciate people verifying further before sharing. I would, but I've been woken by spasms and am posting while waiting for drugs to work and not well placed to do so.

[Woodchopper]

Can't verify source,mbut it's claimed this happened during tonight's attack on occupied Sevastopol.



For context, Ukraine launched a major attack and appear to have destroyed a landing ship and possibly a submarine as well as potentially other targets, right where that outage is claimed. There's enoug misinfo out there right now, though, that I'd appreciate people verifying further before sharing. I would, but I've been woken by spasms and am posting while waiting for drugs to work and not well placed to do so.

It looks like there was a global Starlink outage. https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/12/2387 ... ork-outage

I doubt it had anything to do with the Sevastopol attack. To start with as far as I know the Ukrainians stopped using Starlink on drones a long time ago.

[Woodchopper]

Russia has managed to overcome sanctions and export controls imposed by the West to expand its missile production beyond prewar levels, according to U.S., European and Ukrainian officials, leaving Ukraine especially vulnerable to intensified attacks in the coming months.

[…]

As a result of the sanctions, American officials estimate that Russia was forced to dramatically slow its production of missiles and other weaponry at the start of the war in February 2022 for at least six months. But by the end of 2022, Moscow’s military industrial manufacturing began to pick up speed again, American officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to disclose the sensitive assessment now concede.

Russia subverted American export controls using its intelligence services and ministry of defense to run illicit networks of people who smuggle key components by exporting them to other countries from which they can be shipped to Russia more easily. In less than a year since the war began, Russia rebuilt trade in critical components by routing them through countries like Armenia and Turkey. U.S. and European regulators have been trying to work together to curb the export of chips to Russia, but have struggled to stop the flow to pass through countries with ties to Moscow.

[…]

Russia adapted quickly with its own efforts to secure supplies of the needed parts.

Today, Russian officials have remade their economy to focus on defense production. With revenue from high energy prices, Russia’s security services and ministry of defense have been able to smuggle in the microelectronics and other Western materials required for cruise missiles and other precision guided weaponry. As a result, military production has not only recovered but surged.

Before the war, one senior Western defense official said, Russia could make 100 tanks a year; now they are producing 200.

Western officials also believe Russia is on track to manufacture two million artillery shells a year — double the amount Western intelligence services had initially estimated Russia could manufacture before the war.

As a result of the push, Russia is now producing more ammunition than the United States and Europe. Overall, Kusti Salm, a senior Estonian defense ministry official, estimated that Russia’s current ammunition production is seven times greater than that of the West.

Russia’s production costs are also far lower than the West’s, in part because Moscow is sacrificing safety and quality in its effort to build weapons more cheaply, Mr. Salm said. For instance, it costs a Western country $5,000 to $6,000 to make a 155-millimeter artillery round, whereas it costs Russia about $600 to produce a comparable 152-millimeter artillery shell, he said.

[…]

In cases where Russia needs millions of one particular component, export controls can grind production to a halt. But the chips needed to make a couple of hundred cruise missiles would fit into a few backpacks, which makes evading sanctions relatively simple, Mr. Alperovitch said.

American officials said they can slow, but not stop Russia from smuggling the parts it needs for missile production and that it was unrealistic to think Moscow would not react to the American curbs. One way Russia has adapted is by shipping components to third countries then diverting them there back to Russia, according to the Commerce Department.

“Because the controls were having a real impact, the Russian government didn’t just throw up their hands and say, ‘You got us, we give up,’ ” said Matthew S. Axelrod, the Commerce Department’s assistance secretary for export enforcement. “They got more and more creative with their evasion attempts. And we have been really aggressively working a number of different ways to clamp down.”

Currently, the United States and the European Union have a joint list of 38 different categories of items whose export to Russia is restricted. American officials said nine of the 38, mostly microelectronics that power missiles and drones, are the highest priority to block.

American and European officials have been working with banks to develop a warning system to alert governments to possible sanctions violations. So far American banks have alerted the U.S. government to 400 suspicious transactions. The Commerce Department has been able to use a third of those suspicious activity reports in its investigations.

On Aug. 31, the Commerce Department accused three people of taking part in an illicit Russian procurement network. One of the three, Arthur Petrov, a Russian-German national, was arrested and charged by the Justice Department with export control violations.

Mr. Petrov is accused of acquiring microelectronics from U.S.-based exporters for the purpose of sending them to Cyprus, Latvia or Tajikistan. Once there, other companies helped send the components onward, eventually making their way to Russia.

One of the challenges for the U.S. government is that Russia does not need higher-end chips that are easier to track, but commoditized chips that can be used in a wide range of things, not just guided missiles.

“It makes our job harder because there are a lot of countries that it’s legal and totally fine to sell those chips to for legitimate commercial purposes,” Mr. Axelrod said. “The problem is when those chips then get diverted and shipped to Russia.”

American and Western officials say there is some good news. Russian production is still not keeping pace with how fast the military is burning through ammunition and wearing out equipment. For example, even though Russia is on pace to produce two million rounds of ammunition a year, it is firing more than 10 million rounds of artillery at the same time. That has led Moscow to desperately search for alternative sources to increase its stocks, most recently by trying to secure a weapons deal with North Korea, American and Western officials said.

And although Moscow has been successful in smuggling processors and circuit boards, it is facing a shortage of rocket propellant and basic explosives, American officials said, material that can be harder to smuggle than circuit boards. Those shortages are likely to constrain Moscow if it tries to step up further production of ammunition, missile or bomb.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/13/us/p ... ction.html

[Woodchopper]

Sweden considers donating some Gripens
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/s ... ine-report

[Woodchopper]

At a recent town hall back home in Omaha, Republican Rep. Don Bacon was confronted by one of his constituents who, like a growing number of conservatives, was displeased with the vast sums of U.S. weaponry and money being given to Ukraine. Why, this man wanted to know, does the congressman believe that after 18 months it remains in America’s best interest to continue bankrolling the war?

[…]

The exchange in Nebraska is emblematic of a growing tension throughout the Republican Party, and among a small number of Democrats, as Congress begins anew the contentious process of considering just how big of a check President Biden can have to sustain the flow of U.S. assistance — and for how long lawmakers will keep the spigot open. American attitudes toward Ukraine are shifting, Capitol Hill is feeling the pressure as the country heads into an election year, and Ukraine’s highly anticipated summer offensive has made only minor territorial gains thus far. So, with each subsequent ask for funding, securing congressional approval is likely to grow more challenging, lawmakers and analysts say.

[…]

The White House sent lawmakers a supplemental budget request in August seeking $40 billion, more than half of which would go toward aiding Ukraine and related efforts intended to shore up NATO allies’ defenses and provide a cushion for other vulnerable countries impacted by the war. The funding, if approved, would bring total U.S. investment to $135 billion, according to an analysis by Mark F. Cancian at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

As the war struggles onward, though, questions like the one aired in Omaha reflect a larger dispute that’s tearing at the GOP, whose raucous right flank is waging an aggressive campaign to rally public support for slashing Ukraine aid. If some Republicans had their way, the price tag on future assistance would be zero.

[…]

the America-first agenda is posing seismic challenges for moderate Republicans as they work to convince the party’s increasingly wary base that standing with Ukraine, and alongside like-minded Democrats, is consistent with conservative fiscal values, essential for U.S. national security and won’t amount to another “forever war” like Afghanistan — an argument pushed by the hard-right.

[…]

In the Senate on Wednesday, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), while jabbing the president, admonished detractors not to “compound his administration’s failures with failures of our own.”
“It is not the time to ease up. … It’s not the time for America to step back,” he said of U.S. support in Ukraine.
Though not explicitly aimed at the Republican-led House, McConnell’s remarks were an indication of the volatility there. This summer, as the chamber worked to advance its version of the annual defense policy bill, a bloc of 70 GOP lawmakers banded together in what was ultimately a failed bid to force a cutback on Ukraine assistance.

Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), who says he will not vote for additional aid to Ukraine, criticized the administration for having offered Congress no coherent strategy, objective or timeline for the war, adding that he needs to see one he can back funding it. “I can support something, but I can’t support nothing. That’s how you get what happened in Afghanistan,” said Mast, an Army veteran who lost both of his legs in an explosion there.


For now, it is unclear when or even if Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who has given mixed signals on Ukraine, will ask the House to vote on a supplemental budget request. (It was McCarthy who said last fall that he did not back giving Kyiv a “blank check” only to say this past spring that he does support U.S. aid for Ukraine.) A spokesman on Friday said considering Biden’s latest funding request is not a priority.

“There has been a shift,” Bacon said of his party and the country. Seventy members is a minority, but it’s one-third of the Republican caucus, he noted.

[…]

The Republican presidential primary race also is playing a role in the intraparty clash over Ukraine. Former president Donald Trump, who holds a strong lead, has repeatedly scorned the security assistance program, telling interviewers that he would end the war “in a day” by forcing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to make a deal with Putin — a suggestion Trump’s critics have read as capitulating to Russia.


At last month’s GOP primary debate in Milwaukee, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy’s hand shot up when moderators asked if any of the candidates would halt funding to Ukraine should they become president.
Ramaswamy, who cast America’s involvement in the war as “protecting against an invasion across somebody else’s border” when those resources could be better used to staunch illegal immigration to the United States, drew sharp rebukes from former vice president Mike Pence and some of the other candidates.

[…]

some Democrats also have voiced concerns about the amount of aid being given to Ukraine, calling instead for greater spending on domestic programs. A handful of progressive Democrats have previously voted against funding for Ukraine, and some last year appealed for a negotiated solution to the war, later rescinding that request.

[…]

In the past few years, the cost of filling up the gas tank on his pickup truck has risen from $50 to $100, Baird said — a fact, he said, that should underscore why his constituents could soon lose their tolerance for funding a war that seems foreign and far away.
“We’re going to have to be smart about the kind of help we can give them,” he said. “ … You know, none of us want another 20-year war.”


Bacon also said he worries about the American public’s patience waning. “At some point, maybe this opportunity closes to help them out,” Bacon said. “And I don’t want that to happen, but I think we should be going in pretty hard right now and trying to get the job done.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national ... publicans/

[Woodchopper]

As the House returns from recess Tuesday, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is facing a new leadership showdown.

He's caught in the middle between a government shutdown threat from House Republican hard-liners demanding spending cuts, opposed to Ukraine aid and threatening to oust him if their demands aren't met -- and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, who supports more Ukraine aid and opposes any shutdown.

[…]

McConnell has reiterated several times on the Senate floor a need for Congress to endorse President Biden's supplemental aid request for Ukraine. While the Senate hasn't yet explicitly laid out the details, it's likely that Ukraine aid could be attached to a short-term funding bill to keep the government open past Sept. 30.

[…]

But the administration's Ukraine-aid request is one of the things that McCarthy's far-right flank in the House is threatening to oppose a short-term stopgap measure over.

"We will oppose any blank check for Ukraine in any supplemental appropriations bill," the House Freedom Caucus, a group of hard-line conservatives, said in a statement in August.

McCarthy could likely pass a clean short-term funding bill on the House floor that includes Ukraine aid with the support of some House Democrats. But doing so would roil the House Freedom Caucus and other hard-line conservatives, who have the power to challenge McCarthy's leadership at any time after that far-right group pushed him into the position early this year only after he agreed to a list of their demands -- including the ability to call for a quick vote to remove him from office.

[…]

The Senate is slowly beginning to work its way through its spending bills. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer set the procedural wheels in motion to tee up votes on a package of three spending bills on the floor as soon as next week

[…]

It's a good first step that demonstrates the Senate's commitment to trying to work on appropriations bills through regular process. But this floor action in no way delays the Oct. 1 shutdown deadline. The three bills are some of the least controversial of the 12.

By the time they complete work on this small package, they could have as little as a week to negotiate a stopgap funding bill to keep the government open while further negotiations take place.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/house-r ... =103029616

[Woodchopper]

to;dr for the last two posts:
Republicans might block additional aid for Ukraine by the beginning of October.