While the situation in the Donbass appears to be currently “frozen” in something of a “violence during a ceasefire” situation, events in the southwestern Ukraine have taken a sharp turn for the worse. Odessa By now, you must have heard that Saakashvili has been appointed governor of the Odessa region and, like everybody else, you must have had the giggle when you read that. So did I. But besides the
The Saker: Please introduce yourself in a few words, tell us which Brigade you served in, what rank you achieved there and what your military speciality was? Ramzes: My GRU Spetsnaz call sign was Ramzes. I was born in Russia. I began service in 1994 and finished service in 1999. I was an airborne cadet for four years and served as an officer with the rank of lieutenant for one
Foreword by the Saker: Just as I was about to publish this interview with Jeff J. Brown, I got the following email for Larchmonter445: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2015-05/26/c_134269678.htm Yang, the man in glasses next to the woman interpreter, is top Councillor for Foreign Policy and often deals as a second Foreign Minister. They hide his importance by describing his portfolio as less than his actions and interactions. He is a brain on policy
Colonel Cassad has published a very thorough discussion of the possibly identities and motives of those who have murdered Alexei Mozgovoi. Thanks for the fantastic work of my brother in arms Uncle Martin I can now post this entire analysis in English. Please forgive me the poor formatting of the article, but I simply have no time to do a lengthy formatting job right now. The original translation by Uncle
Friends, I will be honest with you: the murder of Mozgovoi hit me like a punch in the stomach, just as had happened with Buzina my first thought upon hearing the news was “Oh God – not him!”. I did not always agree with everything these two man said, but they were dear to my heart for their immense, truly shining, honesty and courage. At a time when the world
Russia plans to invite India, Pakistan and Iran into the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) This has been discussed for a very long time already, but this time it is official: Sergei Lavrov has just declared that at the next summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) countries Russia will propose to the initiate the process of accepting Iran a a full member alongside India and Pakistan. Quick reminder: the following
Look Homeward, Hegemon Part 1: Cold War 2.0 Abroad, Cold Civil War Between the U.S. Government and the American People by American Kulak Introduction: We want to start by thanking The Saker for giving us the opportunity to publish a series of articles for this community that looks at the late, great American Empire from a slightly different perspective. While most Vineyard readers come to this website looking for analysis
Unless you read Russian or monitor the free blogosphere, you might not have noticed this, but something big just happened in Russia: Kerry, Nuland and a large State Department delegation have traveled to Sochi were they met with Foreign Minister Lavrov and then with President Putin. With the latter they spent over 4 hours. Not only that, but Kerry made a few rather interesting remarks, saying that the Minsk-2 Agreement
Just a short – but dramatic – year ago, the people of the Donbass voted in a referendum to create the People’s Republic of Donetsk (DNR). They naively hoped that this referendum would force the junta in Kiev to finally begin serious negotiations. Instead, they got *total* war featuring armored assaults, aerial bombings, the use of ballistic missile and chemical attacks. And yet, under these absolutely horrific conditions, the people of
Today will go down in Russian history, as a truly historical celebration of the victory over Nazi Germany. The parade – by far the most beautiful I have seen (alas, only on video, not in person) – was superb and for the first time included the Chinese PLA [People’s Liberation Army]. Clearly, we see history in the making. But something else, no less amazing, also happened today: Defense Minister Shoigu
Today is truly a historical day. For the first time ever, the West has boycotted the Victory Day Parade in Moscow and, also for the first time ever, Chinese forces have marched on the Beautiful Square, (“Red” square is a mistranslation – the “Red Square” ought be called the “Beautiful Square”) with the Russians. I believe that this is a profoundly symbolic shift and one which makes perfectly good sense.
As most of you already know, the Chinese Navy has sent warships into the Black Sea. They are headed for the Russian naval base at Novorossiysk. There have been several reasons given for this trip: As part of the preparations for the visit of Xi Jinping to the May 9th celebrations As part of a possible sale of its frigates by China to Russia As a preparation for joint Russian-Chinese
I am sitting in front of my computer and watch the movie “The Burn,” by Arkadii Mamontov, about the May 2nd Odessa massacre. The movie is very well made and I hope that somebody will subtitle it in English. It shows a lot of video footage of various events, which all took place last year. Scenes include the intercepted telephone calls of local Ukronazi leaders, the smiling faces of the
Unreal. But true. It appears that France will really not deliver the Mistrals to Russia and will pay 1.1 billion Euros in refunds and fines.. I was pretty sure that this was all bluff and that the French would hand them over within *weeks* of declaring that they would not. Not even I could imagine the Hollande government so terminally stupid. But then, they are hardly alone. In this case,
Today I will begin by quoting in full two posts from the blog of Colonel Cassad (we owe this translation to “SA” who has done it especially for this analysis literally overnight!): About the intensity of the western “Voentorg” Instructors from Canada have arrived to train Ukrainian security officers The authorities of the Donetsk National Republic announce an increase in the number of foreign military instructors in the territory controlled
We have all heard the irresponsible statements coming from US politicians and, which is far more worrisome, generals: Putin must be ‘stopped’ and Russia must ‘not be allowed’ to achieve her various nefarious goals. A typical such statement was recently made by retired four-star Gen. Barry McCaffrey: Because so far NATO’s reaction to Putin’s aggression has been to send a handful of forces to the Baltics to demonstrate ‘resolve,’ which
M2A RIP It is pretty clear that the chances of peace, which were always tiny, are getting worse and worse by the day. I personally never believed that the Minsk-2 Agreement (M2A) would be implemented by the Kiev junta and I am not in the least surprised. The most what the junta could do was to withdraw some (not even most!) of its heavy weapons and then bring news ones
Note: Having listened to this 2nd part I am particularly impressed by two statements of Sheikh Imran Hosein in particular: first, that the highest authority of the Quran allows for a free choice of religion, something I was not aware of, and second the Sheikh’s absolutely correct stance that the first ones to make a list of wrongs committed by Orthodox Christians against Muslims should be the Orthodox themselves. There
This just in: the UNSC has adopted resolution “imposes an arms embargo against the Houthi rebels in Yemen and the allied forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh”. How crazy is that?! An international coalition of thugs lead by the Saudis and al-Qaeda is conducing a large-scale aggression against Yemen and when the Jordanians propose to slap an arms embargo on the Houthis Russia simply abstains even though the
