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An oil depot in Russia exploded in a towering inferno this morning after a drone attack thought to have been orchestrated by Ukraine. Three tanks containing thousands of tonnes of diesel fuel caught fire around 6am local time at a site in Bryansk, a Russian region that borders Ukraine to the north. The fire began after a drone dropped explosives into one of the fuel tanks, according to Russian media. Nobody was injured in the attack. Videos taken shortly after the strike showed two fuel tanks spewing smoke and flame with at least one showing signs of blast damage, with...

The Biden administration on Monday notified Congress it has approved a possible $323 million arms sale to Finland as the country seeks to join NATO. The administration approved the potential sale of 40 tactical missiles and 48 Joint Standoff Weapons, made by Raytheon, in addition to accompanying equipment, training and support, the State Department said in a release. Finland, which shares a border with Russia, is in the process of joining NATO along with Sweden. Both countries sought to enter the alliance earlier this year. This State Department said the proposed sale “will support the foreign policy and national security...

ITALIAN police have arrested several neonazis affiliated with the Ukrainian Azov Battalion fighting against the Russians.The police arrested five members of the Italian organisation called the Order of Hagal on Tuesday while another member of their gang is still wanted by the authorities.The remaining gang member, Ukrainian national, Anton Radomsky, is in Ukraine fighting the Russians alongside the Azov Battalion — a neonazi unit within the Ukrainian army.The group is accused by the Italian authorities of stockpiling weapons and planning to conduct terror attacks against civilian and police targets in the country.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov argued on Thursday that Russia's latest attacks against Ukraine's power grid weren't aimed at the civilian population, urging Kiev to "end the suffering" of its people by accepting Moscow's terms to end the war. Russia's requests for ending the attacks include Ukraine proclaiming political and military neutrality, recognizing Crimea as Russian territory and granting independence to Donetsk and Lugansk.Despite millions of Ukrainians currently without power across the country, Peskov told reporters that Russia's military pays "special attention to avoid striking social targets... As for targets that are directly or indirectly related to military potential, they are...

Russian TV Presenter: “The decision of our MoD has become known that we are withdrawing troops from the right bank of Dnieper, that is, we are leaving Kherson… Now, if you are expecting I will explain my opinion on this, then I won’t tell you anything. But I’ll explain why. If I support this decision [to withdraw] then this turns out to be a public call for violation of the territorial integrity of Russia in our criminal code… This is several years of imprisonment. If I do not support this decision and believe that the MoD [is wrong], these are...

Despite the apparent success of the retreat, the loss of Kherson still represents a major defeat for Putin and his armed forces. It was the sole regional capital captured by his army since the invasion began, and sits in a region he declared to be part of Russia just a few weeks ago. Ukrainian flags are flying in the centre of Kherson once again, as Russia fled eight months after taking city Locals gathered on the streets to welcome Kyiv's men as official said entire city is almost under their control Ukrainian artillery hammered Russian units fleeing across Dnipro River...

This list only includes destroyed vehicles and equipment of which photo or videographic evidence is available. Therefore, the amount of equipment destroyed is significantly higher than recorded here. Small arms, ATGMs, MANPADS, loitering munitions, drones used as unmanned bait, civilian vehicles, trailers and derelict equipment are not included in this list. All possible effort has gone into avoiding duplicate entries and discerning the status of equipment between captured or abandoned. Many of the entries listed as 'abandoned' will likely end up captured or destroyed. Similarly, some of the captured equipment might be destroyed if it can't be recovered. When the...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky urged the world to pressure Russia into “genuine peace negotiations” with Ukraine in an address to the nation on Monday, insisting his administration had “repeatedly proposed” talks but received only “insane” responses. Russia first invaded Ukraine nearly a decade ago, in 2014, and has been waging a proxy war in the eastern Donbas region since the invasion and colonization of Ukraine’s Crimea region in March of that year. Russian leader Vladimir Putin escalated the conflict into a full-scale invasion this February, formally introducing Russian troops into the battle theater and bombing major urban centers, including the...

Hours after Aleksei Agafonov arrived in the Luhansk region on 1 November as part of a battalion of new conscripts, his unit were handed shovels and ordered to dig trenches throughout the night. Their digging, which they took turns to do because of the lack of available shovels, was abruptly interrupted in the early hours of the next day as Ukrainian artillery lit up the sky and shells started raining down on Agafonov and his unit. “A Ukrainian drone first flew over us, and after that their artillery started to pound us for hours and hours, nonstop,” Agafonov, who survived...

On 9 February 2017, European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet, a member of the Expedition 50 crew, captured a winter landscape image from the International Space Station. It was of the Dnipro River. The photograph showed a great, coursing white snake that reminded Pesquet of a Japanese ‘Hokusai painting’. The white was ice and it explains why Russian forces on the Dnipro right bank now face a ‘difficult situation’, as described by General Sergei Surovikin, the recently appointed operational commander of Russian forces in Ukraine. In winter the Dnipro freezes over, usually after a 20-day spell of sub-zero temperatures. A...

Welcome to my newest update on Putin’s War in Ukraine. We are now 36 weeks — 254 days — since Russia launched an unprovoked attack on Ukraine. My last update can be found at Putin’s War, Week 35. The Lull Before the Next Storm. There has been some action, but the crappy weather has slowed things down. Also, both sides are somewhat tired after a punishing summer’s campaigning. I look at this period as the break when the fighters have returned to their corners. Two significant items have been covered outside this update. First, the Pentagon is beefing up the...

Vladimir Putin's conscripts have been filmed drunkenly battering each other in an alcohol-fuelled brawl at a training barracks ahead of their deployment to the battlefields of Ukraine. An extraordinary leaked video shows the 'drunk' soldiers punching each other, with some ending up unconscious on the floor during the fight at the barracks in Yurga, Siberia. The video shows Putin's army intelligence and military police dragging the unconscious troops, who are from the 74th Guards Motor Rifle Brigade, along the street and away from the bloody brawl. The footage tallies with reports of low morale and drunkenness among Russian recruits and...

Vladimir Putin’s Chechen warlord Ramzan Kadyrov has declared “Big Jihad” and urged Russian Muslims to fight Ukraine’s “demons” and “satanic democracy.” Kadyrov, one of Putin’s most fanatical backers, urged his supporters to lay waste to Ukraine and backed calls from Russian allies to wipe cities “off the face of the f—ing Earth.” -snip- “I swear with the Almighty’s name, this is the Big Jihad, which we must all take part in and we will not stop. “We will be killing them wherever they are. No matter who is helping them, America or Europe. “There is nothing to worry about. They...

Chechen warlord Ramzan Kadyrov has slammed Russia's 'weak' attacks on Ukraine in the latest show of high profile dissent from one of Vladimir Putin's biggest cheerleaders. The colonel general ordered Kremlin troops to 'wipe out Ukrainian cities off the face of the earth' in a chilling video message on Telegram. The head of the Chechen Republic said Russia should respond with fire and fury to the surge in counterattacks on its border regions. His dire threats come as Moscow doubled down on its warning that Kyiv is preparing to use a 'dirty bomb', amid fears the Kremlin could stage a...

Russian officers and collaborators are evacuating Kherson under the guise of a 'civilian evacuation' as the Ukrainian army approaches, one resident has said. The Ukrainian army has set its sights on liberating Kherson, the second largest city in Ukraine, from Vladimir Putin's forces. Russia has declared a civilian evacuation to funnel residents into Russia, but civilians living there say they aren't the ones being evacuated. 'Mostly it's families of Russian officers, families of Russian officials and collaborators who helped to organise the referendum,' said a local Kherson-based activist and organiser, speaking to Sky News on condition of anonymity. Roughly a...

Musk understands what many commentators don’t: The war will end in a negotiated settlement or it will escalate, possibly into nuclear war.As if to burnish his reputation as a super-villain in the eyes of the corporate press, Elon Musk this week floated an idea on Twitter for a possible resolution of the Russo-Ukrainian war. For his trouble, he was swiftly accused of being a pro-Putin stooge by guardians of the Official Narrative. His suggested peace plan was dismissed out of hand as “Russia-friendly” and, as The Washington Post’s Olivier Knox put it, “designed to lock in Russian territorial gains.”But Musk’s...

Ukrainian-Democratic coordination traces back to 2014, when then-Obama Vice President Joe Biden helped install Petro Poroshenko in Kiev. Then came collusion against Trump. Six years ago, before Russia’s full-scale invasion of their country, the Ukrainians bet that a Hillary Clinton presidency would offer better protection from Russian President Vladimir Putin, even though he had invaded Crimea during the Obama-Biden administration, whose Russian policies Clinton vowed to continue. Working with both the Obama administration and the Clinton campaign, Ukrainian government officials intervened in the 2016 race to help Clinton and hurt Donald Trump in a sweeping and systematic foreign influence operation...

This is a Youtube video expounding an analysis of the implications of the Ukraine war for Russia, out into the future. The presenter/author, Torsten Heinrich, makes no claim about who will prevail in the current conflict. He speaks in a rather careful manner, mentioning sources and listing potential contrary views. He brings up many interesting points about the problems Russia faces going forward, such as alienation of ethnic minorities and the potential breaking of the unspoken social contract in Russia. While time is a precious commodity, I found the 29:49 minute presentation well worth while.

Russia’s TASS News Service released photos on Tuesday of a NATO Seafox mine disposal unmanned underwater drone was found during a scheduled visual inspection of the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline in November 2015. Russia accused NATO of attempting to blow up the pipeline in 2015. The incident made international headlines at the time. Via KimDotCom.

Would someone please define "Neocon"? I can't quite figure it out based on the usage of the word here on FR. From what I can tell it seems to be anyone who doesn't think Putin is the greatest thing since sliced bread. I know it can't be that. Where did the term come from, and what exactly does it mean?