Free Republic

Russia plans to hold drills simulating the use of tactical nuclear weapons, the Defense Ministry announced Monday, days after the Kremlin reacted angrily to comments by senior Western officials about the war in Ukraine. The drills are in response to “provocative statements and threats of certain Western officials regarding the Russian Federation,” the Defense Ministry said in a statement. It was the first time that Russia has publicly announced drills involving tactical nuclear weapons, though its strategic nuclear forces regularly hold exercises. Tactical nuclear weapons have a lower yield compared to massive warheads that arm intercontinental ballistic missiles intended to...

There is another historical analogy that I think is worth pointing out, and that is the historical analogy of the early 2000s. Now, in 2003, I was a high school senior, and I had a political position back then: I believed the propaganda of the George W. Bush administration that we needed to invade Iraq, that it was a war for freedom and democracy, that those who were appeasing Saddam Hussein were inviting a broader regional conflict. Does that sound familiar to anything that we’re hearing today? It’s the same exact talking points 20 years later with different names. But...

“We understand that there’s concern about the safety, security and sovereignty of Ukraine, but the American people have those same concerns about our own domestic sovereignty.”Words spoken by House Speaker Mike Johnson in response to a reporter’s inquiry as to why he was holding up aid for Ukraine, certainly, a challenge to both his political and Christian “bona fides.” I would submit that even a 100,000 Central American asylum seekers, including women and children, at America’s southern border do not measure up to 150,000 Russian soldiers armed to the teeth at Ukraine’s eastern border, as was the case on the...

Two senior Republican lawmakers, the chairs of the House Intelligence and Foreign Affairs committees, say their colleagues are echoing Russian state propaganda against Ukraine. Researchers who study disinformation say Reps. Mike Turner, R-Ohio, and Michael McCaul, R-Texas, are merely acknowledging what has been clear for some time: Russian propaganda aimed at undermining U.S. and European support for Ukraine has steadily seeped into America’s political conversation over the past decade, taking on a life of its own. McCaul, chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told Puck News he thinks “Russian propaganda has made its way into the United States, unfortunately,...

Footage showed numerous destroyed tanks, vehicles as well as multiple Russian casualties dispersed in a field. Ukraine has wiped out on of Russia's biggest tank charges since the start of the war, destroying 12 tanks in one day. Footage showed 48 Russian tanks and other vehicles coming under attack from Ukrainian drones, missiles and artillery. It shows the convoy of Russian tanks and armoured vehicles moving in the east of Ukraine alongside soldiers. Kyiv's forces then struck the convoy as it moved down a single road, taking out 12 tanks and eight armoured vehicles as well as several Russian personnel....

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."

The Russian military fired a missile at its [own] trawler Kapitan Lobanov during a Baltic Fleet exercise. [A] second rocket fell into fishing nets nearby. This was reported by the Russian TV channel “Dozhd” with reference to a relative of a crew member. According to him, the rocket fell on the captain’s cabin of a fishing trawler and was simply blown away. As a result of the strike, three crew members were killed and four more were injured. According to the source, the survivors are in the Pionersk hospital, one of the victims is in serious condition. They have already...

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 went to war in Ukraine in February 2022 with no more than nine flyable Beriev A-50U/M radar planes, which extend sensor coverage over the front line. The four-engine A-50s and the 10 or 15 experienced officers who crew each of them are critical and hard-to-replace assets. Which is why the Ukrainians have devoted scarce resources to finding and striking the $300-million planes. A Ukrainian drone damaged an A-50 on the ground in Belarus last year. On Jan. 14, a long-range Ukrainian missile shot down an A-50 over the Sea of Azov in southern Ukraine. Six weeks later on Feb....

Video at link

Moldova’s national intelligence agency warned Tuesday against "unprecedented" Russian interference as the country gears up for a referendum on joining the European Union and a presidential election. The Intelligence and Security Services, or SIS, released a report saying it has gathered data indicating Russia plans to launch vast hybrid attacks against Moldova through 2024-2025 to try to bring the former Soviet republic back under Moscow's influence. Head of the SIS, Alexandru Musteata, said in a press conference that Russia sought to undermine the democratic polling this year in the eastern European country. "There is information about an attempt to compromise...

DRAMATIC footage shows the moment another Russian warship is blown to pieces in a massive explosion. Footage shows Putin's £35million Sergey Kotov corvette being struck by a kamikaze sea drone near Feodosia, in occupied Crimea. Ukrainian intelligence confirmed the strike and said the ship was entirely destroyed. One of Vladimir Putin’s most modern warships, the 308ft long patrol vessel Sergey Kotov came into service during the war in 2022. The vessel normally has a crew of 80 - and the fate of those on board remains unclear. The strike is a major blow to Putin's crumbling Black Sea fleet as...

Berlin has confirmed a leaked conversation between top military officers about the specifics of British soldiers assisting Ukraine in using advanced missiles took place. A conversation that allegedly took place on March 1st involving a group of senior German officers including the head of Luftwaffe (Air Force) Generalleutnant Ingo Gerhartz [above, left] that took place on an open, unsecured line was intercepted by Russia and published over the weekend. Discussing options Germany had for deploying an advanced cruise missile against Russia in support of Ukraine with plausible deniability, one officer reflected in apparently prophetic words: “Just imagine the uproar if...

On the 25th February (a Sunday), 25 year old Aaron Bushnel, a US airman, set himself on fire outside the Israeli embassy in Washington - shouting ‘I will no longer be complicit in genocide’ and, finally, before he collapsed, Free Palestine! Later, he died of his wounds. This reminded me that in the summer of 1963, Thích Quang Duc, a Buddhist Monk, burned himself in public, protesting against the government of South Vietnam’s persecution of Buddhists. This American airman died protesting against the genocide of Palestinians and deserves his place in history alongside Duc. At a personal level, this, for...

STREAMING VIDEO - live 3-2-2024 🔴 The Enforcer 5.1 K Watching 3-2-2024 10:00 p.m EST https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kuu5H5RFtGA

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. Exactly how the Ukrainians are shooting down so many...

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.

German Chancellor Scholz stands accused of handing Russia a propaganda coup in order to smooth over his own political difficulties as he claims the presence of British and French soldiers aiding Ukrainian forces.Scholz has been accused of abusing intelligence and being a bad ally by angry NATO politicians after his remarks about the level of involvement he claims there is of the British and French in the deployment of the Storm Shadow / SCALP cruise missiles they have given to Ukraine, and which have been deployed with devastating effect.(snip)Answering questions on the subject again this week, Chancellor Scholz developed his...

Some powerful arguments made

Officials in Moldova’s Russia-backed breakaway region of Transnistria appealed to Moscow for protection Wednesday, as tensions escalate with the pro-Western government. ... On Wednesday, members of the Transnistrian congress used a rare meeting in the regional capital, Tiraspol, to ask the Russian Duma to “implement measures for defending Transnistria amid increasing pressure from Moldova, given the fact that more than 220,000 Russian citizens reside in Transnistria." A short war in the early 1990s led pro-Russian forces in Transnistria to declare a breakaway state. To this day, Russia stations about 1,500 troops in the region as so-called peacekeepers, who guard huge...