Free Republic

A four-square-mile patch of Kursk Oblast in western Russia is a graveyard for Russian vehicles—and a harbinger of a looming catastrophe for the Kremlin as its yearlong offensive in Ukraine begins to falter. Kriegsforscher, a Ukrainian marine corps drone operator supporting the 20,000-strong Ukrainian force that has held a 20-by-12-mile salient in Kursk since August, tallied around 90 wrecked and abandoned Russian vehicles just in his two-by-two-mile sector on the northwest edge of the salient. That’s an entire brigade’s worth of vehicles. Ukrainian losses in the same sector have been much lighter: just 20 or so. A four-to-one loss ratio...

Monday visit comes amid West’s concerns over Russia assisting Islamic Republic with its nuclear program in exchange for ballistic missiles for use in Ukraine. The announcement came as Russia has condemned Israel’s “political murder” of Iran-backed Hezbollah terror group chief Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut.

The latest development worthy of discussion in last night’s edition of the talk show is the likely fitting of America’s air to ground JASSM missiles on the F-16s that have been and will continue to be delivered to Ukraine. The acronym of this Lockheed produced weapon stands for Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile and its salient features are its range and its nearly undetectable characteristics in flight. The missile apparently has two basic variants, one for approximately 400 km and the other for 900 km. The logic for fitting a couple of these missiles on an F-16 is to enable the...

Other Russian Telegram channels said the attack resulted in about 50 Russian casualties. Ukrainian forces have used the Washington-supplied HIMARS on several occasions throughout the war, including in its Donetsk and Luhansk regions which are largely occupied by Russian forces. The Kremlin has been pushing for the total capture of the two regions—which together comprise the Donbas—since Russia's initial invasion of eastern Ukraine in 2014. HIMARS has allowed Ukraine to destroy Russia's most advanced anti-aircraft missile systems. Washington has supplied the Ukrainians with at least 39 HIMARS since the war began on February 24, 2022. In February, Serhiy Bratchuk, a...

Russian President Vladimir Putin raised eyebrows Thursday when he expressed his support for US Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential bid, flattering the Democratic nominee with some curiously timed remarks. “Our ‘favorite,’ if you can call it that, was the current president, Mr. [Joe] Biden. But he was removed from the race, and he recommended all his supporters to support Ms. Harris. Well, we will do so – we will support her,” Putin said Thursday at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok. “She laughs so expressively and infectiously that it means that she is doing well.” Putin also criticized former president...

Russia has captured 162 square miles of the Ukrainian territory since June 14, the Interfax news agency said Tuesday, citing Sergei Shoigu, the secretary of Russia's security council. Russian forces have captured the village of Tymofiivka in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, Interfax news agency quoted the defense ministry as saying Tuesday. Also, Russian forces have thwarted a Ukrainian attempt to penetrate the border in Russia's Kursk region, the interim governor of the region said Tuesday.

NATO begins to crumble Nato fops and neocon wankers have engineered the biggest military debacle since the HMFIC of Tangut called Genghis Khan a plastic man, very much worse than either Little BigHorn or Dunkirk.You saqy you've never heard of Tangut?? That is because Genghis Khan ordered his commanders to remove every trace on the planet of Tangut ever having existed. Scholars finally started finding written documents in caves in the region towards the middle of the last century; prior to that, they had regarded the tale of Tangut as some sort of a fairytale or a cautionary story for...

Enormous infernos ripped through the night sky in the occupied port city of Sevastopol. And as dawn broke this morning, Ukrainian forces announced they had hit two large Russian warships- Yamal and Azov. Both damaged vessels are Ropucha-class landing ships, 370ft long, 4,000 ton behemoths designed for D-Day-style amphibious assaults. Ukraine has attacked this type of ship before - sinking sister ships Tsezar Kunikov and Novocherkassk. Kyiv is reported to have used British Storm Shadow missiles in the strike - 600mph long-range weapons which have proved effective against the Russians. Putin's crony in Crimea, Mikhail Razvozhaev, was forced to admit...

Victoria Nuland: "With this money, Ukraine will be able to accelerate the asymmetric warfare that has been most effective on the battlefield. As I said in Kiev three weeks ago, this supplemental funding will ensure Putin faces some nasty surprises on the battlefield this year."

It is not reported whether UMPC control modules will be installed on them. The Russians began mass production of three-ton FAB-3000 aerial bombs . This was reported to the Russian Ministry of Defense following the results of Minister Sergei Shoigu’s trip to the enterprises of the military-industrial complex in the Nizhny Novgorod region. “Sergei Shoigu was informed that mass production of FAB-3000 has been organized at the enterprise since February of this year,” the Russian department said in a statement.

French President Emmanuel Macron, in a private conversation, said that in the near future, the confrontation between Ukraine and russia could end in defeat for Kyiv. Politico reported this, citing unnamed participants in a conversation with Macron. The first interlocutor of the publication said that during a private conversation in the Elysee Palace, Macron considered a quick defeat of Ukraine possible. "Ukraine can fall very quickly," Macron allegedly said.

Russia fired 31 ballistic and cruise missiles at Kyiv before dawn Thursday in the first attack on the Ukrainian capital in 44 days, officials said. Air defenses shot down all the incoming missiles, though 13 people including a child were injured by falling wreckage, they said. Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched two ballistic missiles and 29 cruise missiles against the capital. Kyiv has better air defenses than most regions of the large country. The missile interception rate is frequently high, rendering Russian attacks on the capital significantly less successful than during the early days of the war. Even so,...

Vladimir Putin has ordered his security services to track down Russian citizens fighting in Ukraine's military. Speaking at a meeting of the Federal Security Service's (FSB) board today, the Russian leader said those who fought for Ukraine were "traitors" and there would be "no mercy" for them. "I request, as has always been the case in our history, that we do not forget who they are, identify them by name. We will punish them without any statute of limitations, wherever they may be located," he said, according to Politico. He also compared Russians fighting for Ukraine to the Russian Liberation...

More than two years after the whole-scale invasion of Ukraine, is Russia still a near-peer threat to the United States? What are the capabilities of the Russian military after 24 months of heavy fighting against a determined Ukrainian military equipped with Western weapon systems? How soon can the Russian armed forces replenish the devastating losses they have been taking in the fighting? These are just some of the questions the U.S. Intelligence Community analyzes in its latest annual threat assessment. Released every year in early spring, the annual threat assessment delves into the most acute threats to U.S. national security...

Russia's President Vladimir Putin has hailed the "return" of Crimea to Russia at a concert marking the 10th anniversary of the illegal annexation of the territory from Ukraine. He said Crimea had "returned to its home harbour" and that it would move forwards with Russia "hand in hand". ... On Monday, Mr Putin said the "return" of those four Ukrainian regions to Russia had turned out to be "much more grave and tragic" than Crimea. "But in the end we did it. It is a big event in the history of our country," he said, describing the occupied territories as...

Here is a very good assessment of recent Russia successes in targeting and destroying high value Ukrainian assets. Preston Stewart is perceptive and objective observer and analyst. He has recent experience as an American army artillery officer who has held a number of artillery slots and it is evident that is knows this subject well.

President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday that Russia is ready to use nuclear weapons if its sovereignty or independence is threatened, issuing another blunt warning to the West just days ahead of an election in which he’s all but certain to secure another six-year term. The Russian leader has repeatedly talked about his readiness to use nuclear weapons since invading Ukraine in February 2022. The most recent such threat came in his state-of-the-nation address last month, when he warned the West that deepening its involvement in the fighting in Ukraine would risk a nuclear war. Asked in an interview with Russian...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday urged the West to deliver more air defense systems after at least six people were killed in the latest Russian strikes. Ukraine is currently on the back foot in the two-year war as a crucial $60-billion aid package is held up in the U.S. Congress. Kyiv also appeared to have had launched its own overnight drone attack that damaged a residential building in Saint Petersburg, Russia's second city. Kyiv has admitted it is heavily outgunned and outnumbered, facing ammunition shortages amid aid delays. Half of all promised Western ammunition arrives in the country late,...

The Russian air force lost another Sukhoi Su-34 fighter-bomber on Thursday, the Ukrainian air force claimed. If confirmed, the Thursday shoot-down would extend an unprecedented hot streak for Ukrainian air-defenses. The Ukrainian claim they’ve shot down 11 Russian planes in 11 days: eight Su-34s, two Sukhoi Su-35 fighters and a rare Beriev A-50 radar plane. But those 11 claimed losses are worse than they might seem for the increasingly stressed Russian air force. In theory, the air arm has plenty more planes. In practice, the service is dangerously close to collapse.

"Russian officials and state-run and state-affiliated TV channels likely refrained from commenting on the two-year anniversary of the start of Russia's full-scale invasion to avoid drawing attention to Russia's failures to achieve its stated strategic goals in Ukraine and its more immediate goals of seizing all of Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts, while also suffering high personnel losses," the ISW said... The think tank said a recent opinion poll, conducted by independent Russian opposition polling organization Chronicles between January 23 and 29, suggests that "Russian sentiments about the war in Ukraine have largely remained unchanged in recent months and that most...