Posted on 08/10/2024 12:45:51 PM PDT by ransomnote
ransomnote: I will post the title of the video below, without a link, in case some here are not aware of the problem with Google's YOUTUBE pages right now. Basically landing on a YOUTUBE page, even if you don't launch a video, can steal your FR password and passwords to any other application you have open. Read more about it on the following Free Republic thread: Google is at it again, new YouTube security threat
ransomnote: I just watched a 75 minute video update on the war in Ukraine. The first part of the video deals withthe Ukraine. The last 10 minute of the video covers Iran/Israel. I'm posting my notes on the Ukrainian portion of the video.
Mercouris begins by making remarks regarding the theory that the Kursk nuclear plant is the primary objective of the Ukrainian brigades around Kursk.
4:00 Ukrainians troops were 25 Km-30 Km from nuclear power plant at the time the video was recorded. Mercouris believes if they haven't taken it by that point, they likely won't ever reach it, and will fail to capture their primary target.
4:39 Various theories why they tried to get the plant. President Zelensky's aid Mykhailo_Podolyak gave a television interview in which he said the purpose was was to seize Russian territory to use as leverage in future negotiations.
Mercouris says that this makes no sense - it's inconceivable that Russians would negotate if the Ukraine was in possession of as little as 1 millimeter of Russian territory. The Russians have the forces to drive the Ukrainians back and would be unwilling to negotiate.
The Chinese understand this - there's an article in the Global Times showing that the Chinese are very angry about what has happened in the Ukraine as they claim it will dash the hopes of peace talks. A Chinese writer said that the Ukraine is trying to demonstrate its capability to fight in order to avoid being abandoned by the international community. Recently the Chinese met with an official from the Ukraine to discuss peace talks but found the Ukrainian official had not brought any proposals. Then the Chinese were angry to discover that instead of pursuing negotiations, the Ukrainians have escalated the war (kursk).
Mercouris believes the Ukrainians know an incursion, occupation of a few villages, attempts to seize the nuclear power plant would do the opposite of providing negotiations leverage; instead, it would make peace negotiations impossible.
The second possibility for the reason the Ukraine is occupying a small number of villages is to panic Russians, exert pressure on Putin and force a regime change in Moscow itself. While there are probably still people who believe this, Mercouris is astonished that anyone still entertains these hopes at this point in the war and there is zero prospect of that happening, and the Ukrainian government must agree.
By their own admission, the admission of their intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, has admitted the the Ukrainians have tried many times to assassinate Putin, and Mercouris believes the Ukrainians no longer expect Putin to be overthrown by the Russian people.
The third theory - some have floated the idea this is a means by which the Ukrainians would interupt the remaining flow of natural gas through the Ukrainian pipelines to Europe. Apparently near this town of Suyza (spelling?), there's some kind of gas transfer facility. Mercouris believes this third theory is fasle - the Ukrainians could sabotage their own pipelines if they wanted to interupt gas to Europe, they don't have to advance into Russia to do it. (12:36)This kind of minor incursion is not sufficient to shock the Russians into winning the war.
Another theory - the Ukrainians launched this attack will force the Russians to redeploy from areas where the Ukrainian forces are crumbling to Kursk. Mercouris says this is unlikely because the Ukrainians know the size of Russian forces and that Russians have enough to dispatch to a new incursion area.
The nuclear power plant in Kursk remains the only valuable target - if the Ukrainians can capture it, consolitdate its control, establish defenders there - the Russians would not want to battle in a nuclear power plant near a major city. If the Ukrainians could cling on to it, they could seek concessions from Russians (freeze, ceasfire, the return of the Zaporizhia power plant in southern Ukraine- an obsession of the Ukrainians).
The Russians didn't expect the Ukrainians to attack this area, the Russians have deployed troops to the area to secure the nuclear power plant.
During this time, the Ukrainians took control of a few villages. Once the Russians secure the nuclear power plant, they are expected to turn their attention to driving the Ukrainians out of the villages. (22:26)
The Russians have ample troops in this area and are expected to start counter-attacking - some reports say the Russians have begun countertacks (village of Malyaloknya sp?)
Russians control most of Suzha (sp?), Ukrainians don't occupy as much territory as they claim.
Pattern of the battle - the Ukrainians are not expected to have time to create fortifications to withstand Russian attacks. In Donbas the Ukrainians have had years to create their fortifications. Inevitably, the Russians will retake the incursion areas unless the Ukrainians are able to capture the nuclear power plant. That possibility is fading.(28:57)It appears that Ukrainian advances are slowing and that likely indicates the arrival of Russian opposition.
Mercouris mentions the Russian commentator, (Boris Rozhin?), with a military background (named at around 29:44) who makes the point that reports based on the detection of Ukrainian reconnaisance doesn't mean that the Ukrainians control those points, and once Russia establishes troops there the Ukrainian reconnaisance groups will not be able to continue as they are and the fighting will become more stable and comprehensible. Mercouris notes that there is a temptation for people to see an armored vehicle (Ukrainian) and then assume that the Ukrainians control that point.Mercurious quotes the Russian Defense ministry (below) but pauses to note that he's not asserting that Russian Defense Ministry updates are, "absolutely truthful or authoritative," but that he tends to find, with some exceptions over the course of the war, they've provided the most generally reliable information.
(31:52) Russian Defense Ministry latest update about the fighting: The Ukrainian incursions are raid operations and the Russians are hunting down an destroying reconnaissance.
Mercouris goes into field details and lists what the Russians say in their report as to killed/wounded, and numbers of specific miitary hardware destroyed (tanks, armored vehicles etc.). Russia claims 945 Ukrianians killed/wounded since the Kursk incursion started August 6. Mercouris notes that over time, the Russian Defense Ministry has provided data that is roughly correct. Mercouris notes that about 2 weeks ago Reuters published an article about shell production in the United states. (38:16)In the article, a Ukrainian army officer (General staff) discussed Ukrainian killed/injured over certain specific periods with Reuters, and the numbers were very close to the same as those reported by the Russian Defense Ministry for that same time period.
Mercouris believes that the 945 killed/wounded number Russia gave for the Ukrainian loses in their Kursk incursion thus far is correct - and he notes that over that same period of time, there have been urgent demands from Ukrainian hospitals for supplies of blood. This need for blood seems to confirm that Ukrainian losses in the Kursk operatio are turning out to be extremely high.ransomnote: But perhaps this means also that the Ukrainians are removing battlefield dead/wounded at higher rates? There has been fighting wherein the Ukrainians can't recover the dead or wounded (conscripts). The troops committed to this Kursk incursion are said to include one of the best of the remaining Ukrainian brigades - high value soldiers.
Mercouris says he thinks the high killed wounded rate (945) is likely true and that the Ukrainians passed into a fire storm when they crossed the border and tried to move toward the Kursk nuclear power plant.
If this level of losses is correct and sustained, then over the next couple of days this operation will start to fade out.(40:25) Mercouris turns to a popular question -How is it possible for an operation like this (assembly of 3- 4 Ukrainian brigades near the border) which then advance across the Russian border, to take place at all?0
Was it the result of corrupting, incompetence etc.? He's seen a lot of people theorizing but he says he doesn't know the answer. He's making educated guesses - he thinks there must have been negligence and failure on the part of someone (Russians), clearly the Ukrainian forces must have been detected, moving 4 brigades to position would have been noticed. The Russians must have detected the deployment of Ukrainian brigades, instead of building fortifications, reinforncing the border, deploying mind fields and other measures, the Russians were then caught by surprise when the troops crossed the Russian border.
There have been some reports that the Russians have been planning their own offensive in the Sumy region, and to make that attack possible the Russians have been gathering forces and cleared their own minefields in that area so their own troops could pass across the border safely to advance in Sumy region. It's also possible that the Russians assumed the Ukrainian brigades on the border were there to defend against the Russian offensive in Sumy region, which both sides knew was being prepared.In other words, did the Russians misjudge what the Ukrainians were going to do? Mercouris says that might make sense, and from his own experience, he suggests one of the reasons the Russians were caught out, why this whole operation took them by so completely by surprise, is because it makes it makes no military sense, no logical sense for the Ukrainians to launch an offensive at this time against Russian territory. The Ukrainian forces are in deep crisis in Donbas, their forces in Petrosk, Chasiv Yar, Toretsk are collapsing, there are more reports that the Russians have captured the fortified buildings in Northern Volchansk. It makes no sense for Ukrainians facing this massive crisis across the battle front to commit some of their best troops to this reckless gamble of an operation, entering Russia, trying to advance 10 -15 kilometers toward the power plant that Russia is certain to defend.
Speaking as a former professional, based on his past, Mercouris says one of the things that professionals are bound to encounter, especially if they are involved in conflict type situations (e.g., lawyers, generals), "it's indeed very difficult to predict the actions of an amateur." What to a professional makes absolutely no logical sense, what might seem to a professional to be a crazy thing to do, an amateur - Zelensky, Budanov to some extent, Syrsky, maybe even some of the people in NATO, might none the less try to do. That could explain, combined with the other things, why the Russians weren't prepared for this. (46:56)
There is no doubt going to be an inquest in Russia to determine who failed to make the necessary decisions, some people will be punished, dismissed (re not preparing on the border).
Mercouris says that this is a consistent story of this conflict up to now, it's happened several times - it's possible to take the Russians by surprise, but it's impossible to panic them, and there is currently no sign of panic in Moscow, no sign that the decision making processes in Moscow have broken down. Russian troops are being deployed to the area, the situation is gradually being brought under control.This leads the other question, if this operation makes no sense (one unit was taken from Chasiv Yar), why would the Ukrainians stake so much on a gamble like this? Divert some of their best troops, take some of the people who were in the reserves guarding the Border with Belarus? The Russian General Apti Alaudinov (commander of the Akhmat special forces, has said the situation is serious but not critical and the Russians are bringing it under control, and by taking this step, the Ukrainians have taken what are absolutely their very last reserves. Mercouris: "This is in effect, the last shot in Ukraine's locker."
So why would the Ukrainians do this? Why take this reckless gamble of this kind, at this stage in the war? Mercouris gets the sense that over the course of the last couple of weeks that the Ukrainians have finally realized that they are going to lose the war. On the one hand they've been talking about negotiations in order to avert the final defeat. But, they seem incapable of making the substantive concessions to the Russians that would make those negotiations possible. (51:37) Given these circumstances, and given the mindset of Ukraine's leaders, and some of their backers in NATO, "it's not perhaps that surprising psychologically that the Ukrainians have gambled everything on one last throw of the dice. In fact, it's what you would expect them to do. One could even say that this operation is a further sign that the Ukraine is losing the war and is likely to hasten the end of the war as Germany's December 1944 Ardenne counter-offensive, perhaps fairly similar in conception, also did."
He notes that this is speculative, and that his own opinion is that as long as the nuclear power plant is securely under Russian control by this point in the incursion, it's becoming increasingly unlikely that the Ukrainians will reach, much less capture the plant. Soon we might be talking about the failure of this offensive.
As the Ukraine stakes all on this incursion, everywhere else, the situation gets worse and worse. The Ukrainian general staff or the Ukrainian intelligence agencies appear to have given instructions to their various mapping projects and reporters to maintain radio silence about everything happening on all of the other battlefronts. Instead they are only to talk about the situation in Kursk. While not surprising, this radio silence is leading to a virtual silence ( blogs, telegram channels, social media etc.) on the part of many of the other mapping projects and reporting agencies as well. This shows that they all have been getting their information directly from Ukrainian sources, as opposed to what the Russians have been saying. The Ukrainians publish a lot more information than the Russians, but Mercouris said he hadn't been aware of how dependent all of these various blogs, telegram channels, mapping projects all were on Ukrainian sources.
For example - there's much less information about Toretsk over the last 24 hrs, although Mercouris understands that the Russians have been able to take control of the greater part, and are planning an attack on the last remaining village beyond it.
Chasiv Yar -it looks like the Ukrainians pulled troops out of Chasiv Yar to send to Kursk because they know Chasiv Yar is soon going to fall to the Russians. Mercouris notes two other villages where Russia appears to be capturing, and have started another attack on a village. The TO511 road is expected to soon be open to further Russian advances.The Russians have ample reserves to contain the Kursk incurrsion and they have not redeployed forces from other areas. The US appeared to distance itself from the Ukraine's incursion while it simultaneously authorized the use of its stryker and other American armored vehicles in Russian territory. Mercouris wonders if the US had fore-warning, and if the Western powers, NATO, might have played a role in preparing and planning it. While not existentially reliant on the outcome of the Ukraine's war, the political future of some leaders depends on the outcome. As the West seems incapable of serious negotiations thus far, they might encourage the Ukrainians to take this gamble.
The Russians are treating this incurrsion as terrorism. A comment on an article suggested this is likely the last big Ukrainian action and now they will transition to guerilla war tactics instead. Mercouris says that theory bears keeping in mind.
Ukrainians tried again to land 20 boats, special forces on the Eastern bank of the Dnipo river; the Russians defeated them, sank several the boats, the operation failed. There are rumors of a planned Ukrainian attack on the Crimean bridge.
Mercouris thinks the failure of the Kursk incursion may mark the outcome of the war will be decided, and the leadres of the Ukraine might then transition to something else.
At 1:07:28 Mercouris transitions to discussion of Iran.ransomnote: when I looked up General Apti Alaudinov on the Internet to get the spelling of his name, I found this: "Jun 20, 2024 — General Apti Alaudinov, commander of the Akhmat special forces, claims the war with Ukraine will be over by the end of the year."
https://www.newsweek.com/russian-general-end-war-ukraine-2025-1915305
Russian General Floats Deadline for End of Putin's War
Published Jun 20, 2024 at 11:54 AM EDT
Also, I recall Mercouris saying in a previous video that the actions of the West and Ukraine indicate that they were deploying an endless series of tactics to provoke Russia to war. I suspect the Kursk incursion targeting the Kursk nuclear power plant is really a last ditch effort to provoke warwith Russia. Attacking post 2014 regions of Russian Territory did not provoke the desired war, so they planned a reckless incursion into pre-2014 Russian territory to get things started. In case that wasn't sufficient provocation, if the Ukrainians held the plant, threatened to destroy it or otherwise blackmailed the Russians, it could certainly escalate hostilities. Mercouris mentions that the Ukrainians have been intensely focused on recovering their own power plant from Russian control. I can see that as an energy source, it's important, but I frankly think the West wants war by any means possible and somehow, nuclear power plants and or nuclear fuel are of sinister interest to them.PS: Mercouris has released a new video in the past two hours titled, "Rus Counterattacks Kursk, Ukr Falls Short; Rus Reaches Pokrovsk Outskirts, Volchansk Citadel Falling" The first half hour of that video covers Israel/Iran. At the start of the Ukrainian portion, Mercouris says it is his personal view that we're beginning to see the failure of the Ukrainian incursion.
PING in case you’re interested
Use Rumble when possible.
Quote of the year. Explains the whole Biden Harris administration.
If I understand this statement, then opening YouTube, while other webpages are open, will enable YT to then steal the login info? Conversely, opening YT by itself means they can't?
Maximum caution is advised.
In the General/Chat forum, on a thread titled MY NOTES on UKRAINIAN WAR VIDEO | Ukr Kursk Offensive Bogs Down, Kursk NPP Beyond Reach, Ukr Losses; Rus S400s Iran, US Threatens Iran, ducttape45 wrote: Basically landing on a YOUTUBE page, even if you don't launch a video, can steal your FR password and passwords to any other application you have open. Read more about it on the following Free Republic thread: Google is at it again, new YouTube security threat. If I understand this statement, then opening YouTube, while other webpages are open, will enable YT to then steal the login info? Conversely, opening YT by itself means they can't?
Yes but there's more. I hope all will read the linked FR article about this because I'm not certain of all the ramifications. The login information is saved in your computer's cache and can be accessed the moment you click on a youtube tab, even before the page displays images. Then you need to clear your computer's cache completely or the information will be shared in following days. There's a work around that might be over my head. No other options (VPN, malware prevention etc.) prevent theft of login information. Starting a different browser to watch YOUTUBE videos in doesn't work because the browsers share the same cache.
I checked for this video on Rumble and it's not there. I wonder where else Google has planted this technology - possibly it's email pages? So I wonder if logging into gmail would trigger the same login captures.
Wow, this is beyond unethical. I guess one of the questions I got is it actually YT doing this, or has someone developed this security threat and hijacked YT.
Wow, this is beyond unethical. I guess one of the questions I got is it actually YT doing this, or has someone developed this security threat and hijacked YT.
In the General/Chat forum, on a thread titled MY NOTES on UKRAINIAN WAR VIDEO | Ukr Kursk Offensive Bogs Down, Kursk NPP Beyond Reach, Ukr Losses; Rus S400s Iran, US Threatens Iran, ducttape45 wrote: Wow, this is beyond unethical. I guess one of the questions I got is it actually YT doing this, or has someone developed this security threat and hijacked YT.
It's Google. Google owns YOUTUBE, and Google has done this before. The poster, openurmind, who created that thread of information noted it's just in time for the election....
Wow. I don’t know how well I’m protected from all this, but man, this is all getting out of hand. I use Brave, and I have Adguard Adblocker installed on it, but I wonder if also installing Privacy Badger will also help.
The only fix for this issue is near the bottom of the thread I linked. Adblockers and privacy software won’t help.
Thanks for another notes on these videos. You’re the best!
Can’t the FR tech staff automatically disable any linkage to any youtube page or video?
Re my post #14 - Is the FR tech staff even aware of the situation vis-a-vis Google/youtube as you describe it?
PS - I don’t like the proliferation of this or that random vids on FR anyway.
If this level of losses is correct and sustained, then over the next couple of days this operation will start to fade out.
———-
No $hit. I follow non western news agencies, plenty of geo located video showing the Ukies once again getting hammered…Vlads FAB’s are hammering their supply lines….this is obviously going the way of their infamous failed summer offensive.
Another PR Hopium stunt, with huge amounts of Ukie losses….the “ Last Ukrainian “ is getting nearer every day.
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