Illustrative Image
Written by Julian Macfarlane, media analyst from Tokyo
Shame!
The New York Times has become a soulless tabloid. It no longer does “journalism”. Instead, it mews and spews US State Department and CIA propaganda.
So far, the only thing it hasn’t done is to accuse the Russians of throwing babies into the air to catch them on bayonets, as the British claimed the Germans did in WWI. Not that the Germans actually did that! But the NYT picked up those stories too.
The only reason they are not running a similar story today is the Russians don’t use bayonets – they just don’t fit well on modern AK rifles.
A quibble.
With a little ingenuity, the NYT will manufacture something similar –maybe Russians throwing babies in the air for shooting contests.
Do I exaggerate? Yes. But not by much.
Case in point, a recent article in the NYT.
Dead, Alive or Devastated After Russian Strike on Apartments.
Click to see full-size image
This article is full of inaccuracies and outright falsehoods, which no serious journalist should put their names to. But Megan Specia and Nicole Tung did exactly that. Shame! And shame on their editors—and on you — if you subscribe to this rag.
The aim of the piece is to portray Russians as monsters, who just want to tear people apart. Orcs, as in Lord of the Rings.
Yet, Russian policy has been to try to avoid civilian casualties.
It is not in their interest to do what the Banderites do – continuous shelling of civilians, —not to mention mutilation, rape and murder—which the goons in Kiev see as effective methods of ethnic cleansing. After all, it worked for Stepan Bandera in 1943.
The Ukraine has yet to recognize Bandera’s genocide of 100,000 Poles, much less his annihilation of Jews.
The raison d’etre of Russia’s “intervention” was framed in moral terms — the “responsibility to protect”, to prevent “genocide”. You might argue that ethnic cleansing and genocide are not the same thing. But death is death. And to ethnically cleanse you must make people afraid.
Prior to February 24, UAF shelling of civilians in the remnants of Donbass and the LPR increased steadily, despite the Minsk accords, as NATO built a UAF proxy army for a “final solution”.
None of these facts matter to Specia and Tung’s story line.
It is considered a war crime to deliberately or recklessly attack civilian populations or places where civilians would be likely to congregate, but Moscow has paid little heed to the international rules of war.
The assault on Dnipro was hardly the first time a Ukrainian population center far from the front lines — including the city itself — had been targeted since Russia invaded in February. Russian strikes on train stations, theaters, shopping malls and residential neighborhoods have led to significant loss of civilian life, as has the shelling of cities and towns near the front line.
“Train stations”? They mean the missile strike on a train station in Kramatorsk in 2022. Later conclusively proven to have been carried out by the Western Ukrainians themselves. LINK
“Theaters”. They mean that theatre in Mariupol. Similarly proven to be a false flag. LINK, LINK
“Shopping malls”? An occupied shopping mall in Kremenchuk was hit by debris from a precision strike on the Kredmarsh machine shop adjacent to it. LINK
Then, of course, residential neighborhoods! The Russians do not target these. Why would they when they have much better targets? In any case, they pay scrupulous attention to the “international rules of war”, certainly compared to Ukraine, NATO or the US.
However, civilian infrastructure is often hit by debris from Western Ukraine’s air defense missiles, including their own S300s.
Shame! It is not Russia committing war crimes. It is Zelensky’s Western Ukraine. (Video here) LINK
Specie and Tung bolster their argument with an insert called “The State of the War”.
The State of the War (Rebutted)
Soledar:
The Russian military and the Wagner Group, a private mercenary group, contradicted each other publicly about who should get credit for capturing the eastern town. Ukraine’s military, meanwhile, has rejected Russia’s victory claim, saying its troops were still fighting there.
No, the Wagner Group and the MoD did not “contradict” each other. The Wagner Group talked about its success. The Russian military talked about theirs. The credit for Soledar is shared. Naturally each group talks about what it did!
Russia’s Military Reshuffle:
Moscow has shaken up its military command in Ukraine again, demoting its top commander after just three months and replacing him with a Kremlin insider who helped orchestrate the ill-fated invasion.
No, there was no “demotion”, no reshuffle. No replacement. Merely clarification of already existing roles. Name changes only. Gerasimov was always in command. Suvorikn was in charge of aerospace with Salyukov and one other.
Click to see full-size image
As the war progresses, Russia is trying to learn from its mistakes and also to streamline the Russian command structure, which still retains vestiges of Soviet style military bureaucracy. As Putin reinvents Russia, he is also reinventing its armed forces And Gerasimov and Surovikin and the less well-known Salyukov have been – and still are — key players—driving reform from the top, responsive to mistakes on the ground.
Western Escalation:
A cease-fire proposal seemingly aimed at splintering Western unity has instead been met with an escalation of military involvement by Ukraine’s allies.
What cease-fire proposal was that?
Putin’s offer of a Christmas Truce so Orthodox Christians could go to church? LINK
The Western “escalation” is verbal rather than actual—since the US and NATO are just clearing their garages of old shit, which is not going to help much since even when refurbished. It is mostly unsuitable for the Ukrainian scenario, hard to supply and maintain, and mostly unavailable until next year, by which time Novorossiya may have replaced “Ukraine.
New Equipment:
The Western allies’ provision of infantry fighting vehicles signaled their support for new offensives. Now it looks likely that tanks will be added to the list of weapons being sent.
As if a few tanked-out tanks would make a difference. The title should be “New Old Equipment”.
In the first couple of weeks of the war, the Russians lost a lot of tanks, although not nearly on the same scale as the UAF, which to date has lost close to 8000. After the drive to Kiev, losses were fewer.
The Russians learned quickly.
Most tank losses in Ukraine came from mines, IEDs even, anti-tank weapons and air power.
Message to NATO: massive WWII tank battles — the kind that the Abrams was designed for — were almost a century ago.
Click to see full-size image
Tanks have their uses, but also their vulnerabilities. For effective use, they need support from AFVs, drones, and infantry – all of which require training, integration and organization at the battalion level.
One reason, Russia is going slow in the Donetsk is simply that has re-train an army of more than 300,000. They all have military experience, but this is a new kind of combined arms war.
The UAF ‘s new equipment. Simply put— too little; too late.
Specie and Tung’s “The State of the War” might make the grade in a high school newspaper. But this is not “journalism”.
OF course, the substance of this article is the claim that the Russians deliberately targeted a residential building with a KH22, which is a Soviet era air-launched cruise missile designed for attacks on American carriers. In its original incarnation – 60 years ago—it was very accurate but did not need the kind of pinpoint accuracy we are capable of today with precision missiles — since it was designed to carry a nuclear warhead.
That was 60 years ago.
The Russians do not waste resources. They progressively develop their hardware. So, the current S35S is really just an upgraded Su27 from Soviet times – but this upgraded fighter is as good or better than any F15 or Typhoon.
The KH22 has been modernized, with its upgraded mode the KH32 appearing in 2016. From 80% accuracy it has gone to a remarkable 97%. It is probably still used in the Ukraine but is largely supplanted by the KH32 for targets requiring precision.
How did the Ukrainians know it was a KH22?
They didn’t! Have you seen any pieces of the missile? Nope.
What really happened?
Most likely, the missile was not a KH22 at all, given the difficulty in shooting down a high velocity missile of this kind. Video footage shows whatever hit the people was moving at a much slower velocity. The best explanation is that the missile was a subsonic cruise missile which the Ukrainians fired at with an S300 from the vicinity of the apartment building.
What hit the building could have been the S300 itself, deflected into the building at low altitude, with the cruise missile falling on one side of the building. Or it could have been the cruise missile deflected onto the building. Or perhaps debris from the impact of both. Such events have happened repeatedly before in other cities.
In any case, a KH22 it was not.
You can see in the video here (courtesy Slavyangrad)
For the rest of the article, click here to go to my Substack page.
