Putin’s Speech …

[ichkeria]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-europe-66006142

Dead man talking …

[ichkeria]

Putin just now:

“I would like everyone to know that the whole of the Wagner group was funded by the state - by the defence ministry and the state budget. We fully funded this group," he said during a televised meeting with security forces.”

What a liar he is

[Peter Pedant]

oo er Mrs
from the wiki article which I know you are all to idle to access:

Fragging should not be confused with the unintentional killing and/or wounding of comrades and/or allied personnel; such incidents are referred to as friendly fire.

[ichkeria]

The things that would have got you
“Fragged” in Vietnam are medal opportunities for Russian troops.
The butchers of Bucha were all honoured

[Peter Pedant]

rambling. I was talking about Michael Collins death in the republic 1923, and commented to a Oirish Danny Boy

I think it was a shooting accident....

an da oirish laddie said " no sorrr, oi tink they were aiming at him"

[naomi24]

Ich, 14.12. Did he happen to explain why they were state funded?

[ichkeria]

They weren’t state funded.
As explained in one of my more boring earlier posts, Wagner is funded by criminal enterprises around the world.
It may be that Putin wants to nationalise the whole shebang but I think that would be rather unlikely. Shoigu was bringing bits of it under the control of the Russia government which Prigozhin didn’t like and was probably the reason for his “mutiny”
But the whole of Wagner?
I don’t know Putin is spouting this nonsense. Perhaps to give the impression that “it’s all one patriotic Russia” and we’re all together and we always were.
He’s finally blaming the west for the whole thing. Pitting a hostile west against “us - we’re all the same - Wagner and the govt”. He’s been a bit slow to bone up with that one: proof were it needed that far from being a setup, he was genuinely rattled

[ichkeria]

Even more ridiculously he wants to launch an investigation into how “the state funds” were stolen.
A state kleptocracy investigating how it was robbed?
At that point he should have been drowned out by irony klaxons.
Gives him a good excuse for the expected purge.

[Khandro]

.............. The consequences of what is currently unfolding in Russia remain unclear. It is too early to confirm whether there is a direct threat to Putin’s regime. This uncertainty only makes certain absences even starker: the absence of popular support for the state during the rebellion, the absence of local resistance to the mutineers, the absence of all the things Putin referenced in his address as evidence of national unity.

As he is increasingly cut off from reality, we cannot know if even Putin believes his romantic vision of Russians united in deference towards constitutionalism – but it is hard to imagine many of those watching his speech were persuaded. Perhaps that is why Putin relied so heavily on his longstanding trump card – that he brought stability to Russia after the anarchic turbulence of the wild 1990s. But amidst a rebellion of war criminal mercenaries, that stability is starting to feel as much a relic of the past as Putin’s timeworn analogies.

The Spectator

[Peter Pedant]

Bucha - more rambling - I THINK
the Ukrainians had an app that told them where the caller was, in GPS, so the people just had to make a phone call when next to a target
without even having to say - the pig is fat - - - or
do you have orchids on Tuesdays.

so the Russians got to shooting anyone with a phone

(this is clearly not a defence in law)

[Khandro]

I've just watched this very good summing up of the situation as of now, & for Putin's future options as he may see them.
I have to say that the nuclear reactor option sounds uncomfortably plausible;

[ichkeria]

Thanks Khandro
I also watched Dimitro Kuleba'a interview on CNN

[Khandro]

Ichi; What do you think about the danger of the mined nuclear reactor?

and have you seen the reporting of the rocket attack on the pizza bar in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine yet?

[ichkeria]

On the nuclear plant see my post here at 08.14

Yes the attack on Kramatorsk used one if they’re more accurate long range missiles. And yet Kramatorsk is only 18 miles from Russian lines and so plainly they meant to target this restaurant.
If I was in the British govt I’d summon the Russian ambassador to a dressing down every day something like this happened: they’d probably have to set up a rota to do it

[Khandro]

ichi; Yes just re-read your earlier post, that would be catastrophe of the first order. The fallout would effect millions of people, some of whom would be in NATO countries, so it would warrant a robust response. WW3 here we come?

[ichkeria]

The Russians would have at least three problems doing this:
One, attribution (which funnily enough Mr Kuleba pointed out in his CNN interview). They were able to bomb the dam and rather disgracefully escape having the finger pointed at them directly by most of the world'd media. If they sabotage Enerhodar it would be even harder to pin it on someone else, or claim it was an accident.
Two: queering their own pitch: for one thing they'd also lose the Black Sea in all probability for trade. This also happened with the dam of course, tho not quite as seriously (draining parts of the Dnipro leaving Ukrainian forces with a nice undefended path across, deaths of their own forces by drowning, and the spread of disease amongst them)
Three: the strong statement by Senators Blumenthal (D) and Graham (R) the other week where they threatened hugh retaliation on behalf of the US administration were such a crime to be committed.
With a lot of these things, the weapon is effective only in the threat. One you fire it, the recoil might be fatal.

[naomi24]

Ich, //They weren’t state funded. //

I know - but he claimed they were. I wondered if he gave a reason or attempted to justify his comment in any way?

[ichkeria]

Some nonsense from Frank Gardner a tthe BBC here:

"The prospect of an unknown number of Wagner mercenaries turning up in Belarus is deeply unwelcomed by its Nato neighbours in Eastern Europe. Officials in the Baltic states say they are closely monitoring the situation.
The Wagner Group recruited heavily from Russian penal colonies, promising convicts their freedom if they survived six months on the battlefront in Ukraine.
Thousands of convicted murderers, rapists and robbers swelled the ranks of Wagner, many of whom perished in the intense fighting around Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine."

I despair: either "Nato" has flipped its lid or Gardner should retire.

But following last weekend’s aborted mutiny by Yevgeny Prigozhin and some of his men, a deal on the future of Wagner has been thrashed out between him, the Kremlin and the Belarus leader, President Lukashenko.

While the exact details of the deal appear to be still under negotiation, Russia has given Wagner fighters three choices: join the mainstream Russian army, go home or go to Belarus.

It is not yet clear how many will go to Belarus, which borders Nato members Poland, Latvia and Lithuania, nor what they will do there.

But Belarus has offered them a camp and there are concerns in Nato about the presence of battle-hardened mercenaries and former convicts setting up camp so close to its borders.

[ichkeria]

Sorry, the
"I despair: either "Nato" has flipped its lid or Gardner should retire." should have come at the end.
If Nato is worried about the threat from that I would be astonished.