Ukraine War Upd. EXTRA: Life as a Mobik, Gerasimov's Failures, & the Chaos of War
Table of Contents 📖
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"In authoritarian regimes, competent soldiers are less important than loyal ones, and as Gerasimov may find out in the future, they also make excellent scapegoats for tyrants wishing to save their own skin."
Hello Team!
Jonathan has a backlog of content to cover. He will start by showing some footage of the war to give a sense of the reality, chaos and danger, without showing anything too horrific.
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Footage from the frontlines
- Special forces team of the Russian MOD in Kreminna forest, soldier shooting a GM-94 pump action grenade launcher
- Intense gunfire and explosions
- Footage from Illia Ponomarenko showing close quarters combat. Jonathan notes one soldier is firing very close to his comrade's legs.
Inside a captured Russian tank
The driver's control panel of a captured Russian T-72B3 tank is shown. It is very cramped with limited visibility through a small slit. No internal video feed like more modern tanks. Jonathan wonders how tank crews manage to drive these vehicles.
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Thread on Gerasimov's failures
Retired General Mick Ryan posts a thread on Russian General Gerasimov's failures:
- Original invasion plan based on flawed assumptions
- Shambolic mobilization in September 2022
- Flawed military transformation program removing Soviet era mobilization capacity
- Rushed offensives in January 2023 with limited success and heavy losses
- Despite failures, likely to remain in position due to loyalty to Putin
- Gerasimov's poor performance will constrain ability to respond to Ukrainian offensives
Putin's rhetoric shift
Putin's language has shifted from conducting a "special military operation" in 2022 to claiming in 2023 that a "real war" has been unleashed against Russia.
Referring to Putin as a dictator
Jonathan suggests mainstream media should refer to Putin as a "Russian dictator" rather than "Russian president", as it is an accurate description. He plans to use this terminology in his own writing.
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Thread on life as a Russian mobilized soldier
Chris Parry posts a thread describing the extreme conditions faced by Russian mobilized soldiers (mobiks) around Avdiivka, based on accounts from survivors:
- Lack of food, water, artillery and reconnaissance support
- Drinking corpse-contaminated water, scavenging for food
- Seriously wounded not evacuated, tensions with DNR commanders
- Piles of rotting corpses, some left for months
- Extremely high casualty rates (up to 92%)
- Missing rather than killed to avoid official statistics
- Motivated to keep fighting out of loyalty to comrades
- Growing disillusionment with the war among soldiers' wives
Wrap up
To end on a different note, Jonathan shares two videos of Ukrainian soldiers helping wildlife - a hedgehog and an owl caught in some netting. One is a video from the recently killed journalist Arman Soldin. Jonathan thanks viewers for their support.
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