Posted on 04/29/2023 2:13:44 PM PDT by marcusmaximus
The head of Russia's mercenary Wagner Group threatened to withdraw his troops from the embattled city of Bakhmut in Ukraine amid heavy casualties.
Yevgeny Prigozhin told military blogger Semyon Pegov losses were five times higher than necessary because of the lack of artillery ammunition.
"Every day, we have stacks of thousands of bodies that we put in coffins and send home," Prigozhin said in the interview published on Saturday.
He had written to Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu asking for supplies. "If the ammunition deficit is not replenished, we are forced, in order not to run like cowardly rats afterwards, to either withdraw or die."
Wagner has been spearheading Russia's assault on Bakhmut but Ukrainian defenders have been able to hold onto part of the city.
Casualties are high on both sides.
Prigozhin had previously claimed that the Russian military was withholding ammunition from his soldiers.
He charged ammunition stockpiles were withheld because of "treason" by Russian officials.
Last week he expressed concern about a counter-attack by well-equipped Ukrainian troops at Bakhmut.
(Excerpt) Read more at dw.com ...
Prigozhin’s call for more ammunition at the very eve of the Ukrainian offensive is more than comedy. Shoigu’s troops failed left and right to advance even a meter, primarily because of the heroic Ukrainian defense and the Russian incompetence, but also because Bakhmut was given every priority. In the end even Russian paratroopers had to make up for PMC Wagner’s failed attempts to advance, costing even more resources.
Russians needed that city so badly that they have wasted every available reserve and more. I’m pretty sure that Shoigu realizes that when Ukrainians break through the lines then it will be his head which will be demanded first. He won’t diminish his already bad odds by giving his rival even a bullet. The feud which both of those men were having, publicly, is now paying off.
https://twitter.com/Tendar/status/1652407955709468674
The EU is doing the world (including Russia) a favor.
More commentary:
1) Putin has ordered that Bakhmut must be taken by May 8th, in time for the Soviet Victory Day parade on May 9th. He has threatened Shoigu and others with dire consequences.
2) Prigozhin has Putin’s blessing as head of Wagner PMC, a mercenary group established and largely controlled by the FSB & GRU (Russian Military Intelligence).
3) Army and intel services famously hate each other. The jockeying for power between the various factions has been ongoing.
4) Expect Wagner PMC to retreat from Bakhmut in the coming days to completely screw over Shoigu and the Russian army. This is a perfect way for Prigozhin to setup Shoigu and other generals.
5) For May 9th, Ukrainians may end up controlling all of Bakhmut, and possibly much, much more. This would have highly unpredictable domino effects domestically in Russia.
6) Right now, the Russian Game of Thrones is just backstabbing, scheming in the shadows, assassinations, and so on. But Bakhmut may turn out to be the catalyst to ignite a ‘hot’ civil war among the factions in Russia.
https://twitter.com/igorsushko/status/1652399267179565057
All 3 sides are wrong on this.
I’ve heard that the Ukrainians have about 60,000 mechanized troops in reserve, ready to use at the point of their choice. It seems crazy to me for the Russians to expend resources taking Bakhmut when they might end up desperately in need of reserves for defense and counter attack.
Prigo is panicking about his flanks and he’s 100% correct to be panicking about them.
This is so flagrant a lie that I have reported it as abuse.
“ Putin has ordered that Bakhmut must be taken by May 8th, in time for the Soviet Victory Day parade on May 9th”
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Why would the Russians want to do that. The HAVE a situation where Ukraine is regularly sending “reinforcements” into a KILL ZONE where they can be annihilated under heavy artillery fire. These Ukrainian forces are not only being killed/wounded in the Bakhmut kill zone itself but also on the trips to and from Bakhmut.
https://www.dw.com/en/us-combats-drought-with-recycled-water/video-65395319
This video was released yesterday. Watch as much as you can stand. California's water crisis has been created by mismanagement, stupidity and graft. The Southwest in general has seen huge population increases without a corresponding increase in infrastructure to handle the increased demand for water. There was no trend in actual long term precipitation until this last year when it was skewed greatly into the wetness issue.
“California has heavy rainfall from time to time, but years of drought have exacerbated the constant threat of water shortages. Water utilities in Los Angeles are quickly recycling stinky sludge into clean drinking water.”
The video acknowledges that heavy rain for months has turned even the some of the most drought-prone areas in California into muddy messes. They gloss over that the snowfall in the mountains have reached levels never measured in modern times. And yet we are still subjected to this leftist enviro-whako nonsense?
In my experience sources that lie to you about some of their favored leftist nonsense cannot be trusted in other areas either. So believe this coverage about Ukraine if it makes you happy, but try and remember that when things seem like they are not going the way that you were told they were that just maybe someone was blowing smoke up your backside.
Supposedly Prigozhin says that he lost 5 men for every one Ukraine lost. Not surprising considering that Putin wouldn’t even given him ammunition.
Both Prigo and Shoigu know that Bakhmut won’t be taken by Putin’s May 9th “Victory Parade” so they’re pointing fingers at each other for who’s to blame.
It would be a real shame if Wagner were to take Bakhmut, and then have to give it up because they are out of everything, bullets.
Putin’s “final deadline” for Bakhmut is May 8th, but his last “final deadline” was April 30th. And before that it was March 31st.
Why not just declare they’ve taken it? Like they did in the Salt Mines, and last year in Mariupol, before they wiped out the Azov units when the Red Cross negotiated their safe passage from the underground factories?
Then they can have the May Day parade with workers carrying banners, soldiers goose stepping and rockets on tracked vehicles, with members of the Politburo, er Duma, overlooking it all steely eyed and sternly.
A May 8th deadline, eh? I’ll mark it on my calendar, we’ll see what happens….
But everybody says Bakhmut is a great Russian victory.
You’re not doing yourself any favors by rooting for Russia. In fact, the reputation of this website is suffering because of the presence of the pro-Russia crazies on it.
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