The Russia is getting more evil thread

[antlers]

In Bakhmut both sides are dying from artillery. Russia keeps trying to knock out Ukrainian trenches with massed artillery barrages.

[Grifman]

@antlers

In Bakhmut both sides are dying from artillery. Russia keeps trying to knock out Ukrainian trenches with massed artillery barrages.

Agreed, but the Ukrainian troops are entrenched, while the attacking Russian cannon fodder aren’t.

[TheWombat]

I would imagine the Ukrainians are able to hold their lines with far fewer men than the Russians have to deploy to attack them. One would hope at least.

[vyshka]

I’m hoping Biden calls his bluff, and names Wagner a terrorist org.

[Timex]

@Dejin

I suspect there’s a big difference between Wagner’s quality pre-Ukraine and now.

Honestly? I bet there isn’t.

[Alstein]

I suspect at combat NCO level there likely was a quality difference initially. Those who wanted to be professional soldiers probably found Wagner conditions better. Doubt there’s an OTS for Russian troops.

That difference likely gone now due to attrition…

[MelesMeles]

@TheWombat

As far as I know, PMCs in the real world, as opposed to video games or technothrillers, tend to draw their baseline quality from the national militaries that provide their personnel. As a rule, for serious PMCs, you don’t join them fresh out of high school; you join after having served in a national armed force where you were (presumably) trained and most likely got some significant experience under your belt.

Absolutely true. I have a friend who did the PMC game.

Wagner seems to be the kind of mercenary company that attracts the really sick and vicious, the way it happened with nazi volunteers and colonial administrations in the past.

The fact that they’re recruiting from prisons says a lot. It’s like Dirlewanger, which I know a lot of you guys are familiar with.

It might make them effective to up to a point, because a lot of them are psychopaths who aren’t as affected by brutal violence - and getting captured is arguably gonna be a lot worse for them than dying - but serving in a unit like that must be hell if you have any humanity left.

[alekseivolchok]

I brought you comedy gold from Russia.

I think Russian subtitles betray the true purpose of such ads: Russians should watch them thinking Europeans watch them in awe.

WINTER 2023 IS COMING TO EUROPE

[KevinC]

Please, Russia, keep reminding Europeans what a bad idea relying on Russia for energy is.

Also, Volkswagen could run this as an ad for their EVs or something.

[ShivaX]

“Just a reminder that we’re unreliable and you should cut the concept of dealing with us out of all your plans forever.”

Weird flex, but okay.

[KevinC]

FTNYT.

Ukraine has hit air bases that Russia is using to launch attacks on Ukrainian civilians. But sure, let’s frame it as Ukraine escalating the war. Not defending its civilians from the aggressor in a war they never asked for.

[JonRowe]

@Timex

I think there was some kind of mythology built up suggesting they were some kind of super soldiers,

I mean, compared to the regular Russian conscript forces?

probably feels that way.

[Strollen]

If the story was a woman, plunged a kitchen knife into the throat of would-be rapist who broke into her house, there is no way the NYT would use a word like escalate. If the man had a history of rape, she’d be held up to be a heroine.

I guess the NYT thinks that Ukraine dressed slutty.

[KevinC]

@Timex

I think there was some kind of mythology built up suggesting they were some kind of super soldiers, but I’m thinking that was baseless hype and propaganda.

Not that I’m aware of, but there is a massive gap between “better than Russian regular units at this point” and “super soldiers”. It has seemed to me that when you read the former you interpret it as the latter, but I don’t think that’s what people are saying.

[KevinC]

@Strollen

I guess the NYT thinks that Ukraine dressed slutty.

Right? I mean, it’s okay for a woman to defend herself, I guess. But she escalated to murder! Nevermind the rapist was also shooting a gun at her children at the time.

[Strollen]

What makes it worse, is the damn NY Times sets that standard for the rest of the MSM. E.G the Newshour’s said this about the attacks “what some people are calling an escalation”, which is strictly accurate since NY Times definitely counts as some people. Plus you’ll never get fired for following the NY Times lead in a story like this.

Short of using a nuke, or biological attack on a Russian city, I don’t think there is a way for Ukraine to escalate.

[ShivaX]

I always saw it more as “actually properly equipped and not unwilling conscripts” which… is better than the usual Russian standard, sure, but far from what most nations would consider some super elite force.

[KevinC]

Yep, exactly. They might be some of the best that Russia has to field but that doesn’t make them elite by Western standards at all. Russia has a lot of underequipped conscripts, being better than that isn’t a very high bar.

[KevinC]

Interesting to see the dividends of continued rightwing/Russian messaging. Random comments from an article on a local news site about Zelenskyy being Time’s person of the year.

It’s interesting, because I didn’t see anything like that in local articles at the start of the war. I feel like for Republicans, if Joe Biden’s administration is supporting Ukraine then they must take the opposite stance and Ukraine must be bad guys.

[aeneas]

The Kyiv Independent