Cont: The Russian invasion of Ukraine part 7

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This has been discussed before. I'm pretty sure that as you go further into Eastern Europe, "nazi" takes on a somewhat different meaning. Here in the west, we equate Nazism with the Holocaust and white supremacist ideology. But it seems that to the east of Germany, people think of Nazism more in terms of the horrors visited upon them by the Nazi regime. They're not making common cause with evil Jew-hating bastards to promote an aryan empire. They're identifying with evil Russian-hating bastards. And really, in Ukraine's case, can you blame them? Adopting the iconography of the army renowned for massacring Russians by the tens of thousands seems reasonable. Especially if you are not burdened by the Western taboo against it.

Of course, Ukrainians were also raped and pillaged by the Nazis, but sometimes you don't have a lot of choices. Even Finland allied first with the Third Reich, then with the Soviet Union, in a desperate attempt to keep itself intact with competing predators on either side.

Why should we be upset about Ukrainian appropriation of the iconography? Other than because of our extreme taboo against it? It's not like the west was there for them, when the Wehrmacht rolled through. It's not like the west was there for them, the last time they were raped and pillaged by the Russian Empire. Why should the west now dictate to them how they should feel about their own history, their own holocausts?

I do think that if you polled Ukrainians, you'd find a problematic amount of anti-semitism. And I think you'd find, perhaps, a distasteful amount of ultra-nationalist sentiment expressed. But I don't think you'd find a race-war-mongering neonazi Reichskult in the mold of, say, the brain-dead American fascist movements.

Whatever the actual extent of the problem (which I'm not convinced is even really a problem at all, except for Westerners who want to see it that way), I think at this point it's safe to let Ukraine deal with it after they win this war.

That's fair enough, and by no means should any ultra-nationalist willing to go to frontlines be denied, and I roughly agree with what you're saying...

I would even go so far as to say it's morally correct to downplay this issue, in favor of encouraging broad public support for Ukraine, rather than harp on it like it needs to be a concern right now.

...except for this. At least, the press should not be in the business of such overt manipulation of the facts, especially for what amounts to a foreign affair for the US. Nor do I think it has that much use. People aren't that stupid, and the internet era means that these traditional gatekeepers of journalism don't have the same exclusive grip on how the news is reported. You don't have to be that perceptive to smell a rat here when the press keeps showing pictures of soldiers with nazi iconography all over them but won't discuss it.
 
There are of course similarly delightful people on both sides.

The go-to image is Utkin, the guy after whose chosen call sign the Wagner group is named and who has SS insignia tattooed on his chest.
 
I couldn't read the linked article, is paywalled. But, I'd surmise its something along the lines of:

OK Russia, you keep calling us Nazi's, despite the fact that we overwhelming voted in a Jewish president. Well then, OK we'll play along. We're "nazis". You are being defeated by "nazis". Theyre thumbing their noses at them in away.

ETA: also may be related to Russia always playing the hero card that they defeated the Nazis in WW2, while totally ignoring all the horrendous **** they did... like cooperating with the Nazis until betrayed by them.

I've seen that idea bandied about, too, on places like r/ukraine. My ignorant foreigner's impression is that there's quite a bit of ironic piss-taking from the Ukrainians, throwing "nazi" salutes and whatnot to send up Moscow's headass narrative. But I do also think that Azov is probably sincere in their "this Totenkopf kills Russians" appropriation of Nazi iconography.
 
I've seen that idea bandied about, too, on places like r/ukraine. My ignorant foreigner's impression is that there's quite a bit of ironic piss-taking from the Ukrainians, throwing "nazi" salutes and whatnot to send up Moscow's headass narrative. But I do also think that Azov is probably sincere in their "this Totenkopf kills Russians" appropriation of Nazi iconography.

That doesn't really make much sense considering many of these neo-nazi orgs predate the current invasion and have roots to ultra-nationalist movements that predate the current hostility with Russia. Prior to the invasion even the mainstream press was quite comfortable speaking plainly about the ideology of these groups.



The key leaders of these groups aren't exactly mysteries. Their commitment to Nazi ideas seems a bit more than edgelord irony
 
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The current hostility towards Russia did not emerge from a vacuum. It is firmly rooted in the historic, generational, and entirely justified hostility towards Russia. Where do you think (ultra)nationalist movements in former SSRs come from? Ukraine has been Moscow's vassal for a long time.
 
The current hostility towards Russia did not emerge from a vacuum. It is firmly rooted in the historic, generational, and entirely justified hostility towards Russia. Where do you think (ultra)nationalist movements in former SSRs come from? Ukraine has been Moscow's vassal for a long time.

Sure. Explaining why neo-nazism might be popular in that context is not dismissing that they are, in fact, neo-nazis. Blood and soil nationalism isn't something we should be comfortable with just because it happens to motivate strong anti-Russian sentiment that we find useful.

While I fully understand the expediency of putting any fit volunteer into wartime service, I do very much worry what these nazi types will expect in any post-war Ukraine. They are likely going to feel very entitled to make their nazi ideals into policy as recognition for their wartime service, and many parts of the country are going to see explicitly fascist groups like Azov as being war heroes.

Going to be a very bad time for anyone not an ethnic Ukrainian, I suspect.
 
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Consider the history of the Ukraine, in 1940 the Nazis would have been looked upon as liberators, had Hitler not decided he wanted to kill all of the Ukrainians, Stalin had been starving them, planting communist party operatives in the towns, sending the citizens for 'reeducation', up until the Nazis showed up, and just started killing Ukrainians.

I'm sure after the war the Russians were all so ANTI NAZI, that they Ukrainians took up somewhat of a Nazi stance simply because the Russians hated the Nazis so much.
 
This has been discussed before. I'm pretty sure that as you go further into Eastern Europe, "nazi" takes on a somewhat different meaning. Here in the west, we equate Nazism with the Holocaust and white supremacist ideology. But it seems that to the east of Germany, people think of Nazism more in terms of the horrors visited upon them by the Nazi regime. ...

Why should we be upset about Ukrainian appropriation of the iconography? ...

Well, the leader of one of those groups, nom-de-plume "White Rex", is well networked with extreme-nazi, white-supremacy groups in other European countries, including Hungary and Germany. This IS exactly the kind of murderous, brutally anti-democratic racist nazi you absolutely do not want to represent your side at all.

Problem is, when Ukraine shall have won the war, and starts rebuilding, these die-hard white supremacist supernazis want their share of power, matching their share of effort and bravery in the fight. Do you suggest dumping them then, or accomodating the nastiest fascists in the future of our ally?
 
Ah, the Moral Equivilency card.
Note how playing that card helps nobody but the bad guy?

It so US service personnel are not the bad guys merely for following orders to torture detainees? Yea warcrimes only get prosecuted if you lose. Why is that so controversial? We didn't do anything in WWII about Americans murdering POWs and Patton endorsed it.

The rule of law is a farce.
 
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davida...-break-through-russian-lines/?sh=51e602bf1641

David Axe is a reliable source. Never really understood why he is working for Forbes. But he knows his subject. He is writing about the locations of the AMX-10s supplied by the French. From the article:

On June 4 and June 5, the army’s 23rd and 31st Mechanized Brigades with their T-64BV tanks reportedly pushed back Russian defenders, potentially including 71st Motor Rifle Regiment and 37th Guards Motor Rifle Brigade, in and around Novodonetske in southern Donetsk Oblast just east of Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

It took me a while to locate Novodonetske. It is right on the front line. South East of a bigger town called Velyka Novosilka. It is to the North and slightly west of Mariupol.

On the one hand, that amount of info getting out is a potential problem. OTOH, not a lot of big highways there. The info might not be real.
 

It's confirmed. https://twitter.com/yarotrof/status/1665908749205409795

The Russian mayor of the town on the Russian controlled side denied it for a time.

Now each side blames the other - but Russia had control of the operation of the dam and the failure seems to have been in the turbine hall, something Ukraine had no access to at all.

As I understand it, this cuts off water to Crimea. Or will, once the level of the reservoir drops below the canal's intake, which it will definitely very quickly.

It may also cut off water to the Zaphoriza nuclear plant. That plant has been shut down for some time but still needs some water to cool heat from decay.

Russia claims that Ukraine did it to flood out Russian defensive positions on the east side of the river.

I haven't read any Ukrainian claims of why Russia might have blown it, but the dam was pretty clearly a potential crossing point of the river. Plus, if Ukraine did try to cross the river below the dam then Russia could do a big release to make that harder for a while - flood the embarkation and landing points. Similarly, Russia could drop the lake level to mess with a Ukrainian attempt to cross the lake - make the embarkation and landing points need to be moved at the last moment.

It was hydroelectric. Loss of electric supply.

My penny's worth of speculation is that Russia mined it so that they could blow it at the last moment before Ukraine captured it. That would make sense.

Maybe the blew it early by accident. Or maybe they thought Ukraine was about to try a river or reservoir crossing. Maybe Ukraine actually was about to try a crossing.
 
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Another view. https://twitter.com/IntelCrab/status/1665925290328031232

There is speculation that they blew the turbine hall. That would cause the structure above the hall to collapse down into it, aided by the force of the water pressing against the structure - but blowing it in the turbine hall would hide the evidence of the explosives. It's all be buried in rubble and silt and washed downstream.

It could have just been a failure of the dam due to lack of maintenance and damage from previous fighting, exasperated by higher water levels due to a wetter than average spring and Russian use of the reservoir and its water as a defensive thing.

But the timing is very, very suspicious. Just when the Ukrainian offensive seems to be kicking off or building up to kicking off.

This would also be a pretty good "screw you" from Russia to Ukraine. Loss of a transport route and a two-for-one loss of electricity: destroy the hydroelectric plant and deprive the nuke plant of reliable water supply. But that would also screw Russian plans to try to hold Crimea as well. Getting the water supply back to the peninsula was a big point of pride for Russia last spring.


ETA: The water level on the reservoir was high enough that it appears that the water started to flow over the top of the dam. I don't know if such dams are typically built to accommodate that. Also, earlier to day some satellite imagery showed that a section of the roadway over the dam had collapsed, although it wasn't clear it that was intentional or not - but would make sense from a defensive point of view.
 
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I wonder how this is going to affect water supplies to Crimea. The Canal starts at the dam.
 
I wonder how this is going to affect water supplies to Crimea. The Canal starts at the dam.


Good question.

Ukraine shut the canal down in 2014 when the Russians invaded Crimea. The Russians managed to get it flowing again last March, after they invaded Ukraine.

So they they got along without it as a water supply for eight years.

I have no idea how well they got along without it.
 
If Russia thinks it's not going to hold the Crimea in the long term, it could be another bit of scorched earth
 
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