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SL Xpress

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  1. Institute for the Study of War has a big update. Lots to unpack. But I want to focus on a specific part of this update: "Several independent sources reported additional evidence that an internal explosion likely destroyed the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (KHPP) dam on June 6. Norwegian seismic monitoring center NORSAR reported that seismic data indicates that an explosion occurred on June 6 at 2:54am local time, about the same time as the collapse of the KHPP dam.[30] NORSAR seismologist Volker Oye stated that seismic data indicated a pulse of energy that was “typical of an explosion.”[31] Seismic data cannot locate the energy pulse of the explosion to a more exact location than within 20 to 30km of the KHPP, however.[32] Oye stated that it would be an “unusual coincidence” if something other than an explosion caused the energy pulse.[33] The New York Times reported that an unnamed senior White House official stated that US spy satellites equipped with infrared sensors detected an explosion at the KHPP dam before it collapsed.[34] The Wall Street Journal reported that multiple engineers and munition experts assessed that an explosive blast likely detonated at a specific point or multiple points of weakness, which destroyed the KHPP dam.[35] ISW previously reported that engineering and munitions experts that the New York Times interviewed believe that a deliberate explosion caused the KHPP dam’s collapse.[36] The preponderance of evidence suggests that a deliberate explosion damaged the KHPP dam. ISW continues to assess that the balance of evidence, reasoning, and rhetoric suggests that the Russians deliberately damaged the dam.[37]" https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-june-9-2023
  2. My mother has some oil and gas royalty paying assets she inherited from her deceased husband. She needs extensive help with them. Does anyone on here have any suggestions on where to start looking for competent help? I'm going to make some phone calls on my own regardless, but I figured there are some people on here in the industry who if they don't have a solution themselves, might have an idea of who I could talk to/ask to point me in a good direction beyond what amounts to cold calling.
  3. Here is my serious advice. Try to have grace for the person involved. I don't blame you for getting upset. You don't need that $5, but it's fucking irritating. Compounded enough in your life, where you pay $5 more than everyone else around you for every good and service you ever purchase for the rest of your life, and it would make a sizable impact on the quality of your life. Luckily, that's not what is happening. But it doesn't help to think of her as pocketing that money. I don't blame you for going there. I go there nearly every single time something bad happens to me. Something isn't where I left it, I immediately conjure scenarios where someone else moved it from where I left it and either took it for themselves or didn't put it back where it belongs. Turns out I didn't actually leave it there. Someone is late for an important appointment? They're assholes who I should never associate with ever again. Then it turns out something truly important came up and they weren't able to communicate with me in a timely manner. I'm not saying Burger Kings shouldn't be burned to the ground. If there were never any consequences for our actions we'd never alter our behavior in important ways. But we both know you're not going to do anything about it. Get mad. I don't blame you. Then accept you were playing the roulette wheel of human incompetence, and somehow your number came up. Weeeee! You win! And there are going to be times you do it to someone else in some way. That woman is working a shitty job at a shitty Burger King with an underpaid shitty manager and assistant managers with unhealthy power trips in charge of her life in ways no one would wish on another person. She deals with anonymous asshole after anonymous asshole on an assembly line conveyer belt of mediocrity. There's no real human connection. Nothing to be proud of regarding what she accomplished that day. And she fucked up your order in a long line of orders and you're never getting that $5 back, nor the time and energy you've invested in it since then. But maybe all of us are doing the best we can to manage our lives in whatever inadequate way we can muster. If we could just manage to give more people even a smidgen of a benefit of the doubt, I think it would be helpful. I'm not saying every fuckery should be about turning the other cheek. But some fuckery should. Maybe this is one of them.
  4. Oh, you know way more than me about the area, for sure. But there's a reason the cultural identities are so strong. I'm not saying there aren't exceptions. But you simply cannot maintain those cultural identities over all these centuries if there are mass intermarriages. And yes, didn't mean to say it was only about the religion. I purposefully mentioned that was a shorthand, with the inaccuracies inherent in using shorthand. I do appreciate the correction. The last thing I want to appear as is someone correcting you on something I acknowledge you know way more about than me. The Greek stuff is mostly about Greece being a primary sponsor in the EU. Not as much about historical ties. But there are some Greek/Turkiye tensions based on Greek support for Croatia versus Turkish support for Bosnia. It's not a main driver for anything. Mostly, like you said, it's all very complicated.
  5. I’m saying fund your fucking mandates. That’s not a Republican/Democrat cloak room issue. That’s a responsible government issue. To me at least.
  6. Yes, but add to that one group is like nitrogen, another group is like oxygen, a third group is like nitric acid, and their historical grievances are like fuel. There’s no assimilation. No real mixing between groups. All of them kept their cultural identity by emphasizing marriage only within their cultural group. While I’m not trying to put Tito on a pedestal, because he was truly a despicable despot, it does show how remarkable of a leader he was that he was able to utilize ruthless repression to keep the groups from killing one another. In some ways they were never more united in terms of their collective hate for Tito And he managed all this while navigating a surprising course between the Scylla and Charybdis of the Soviet Union and the west. Plus there’s some Greek/Türkiye tensions reflected there, too. Basically you have the Roman Catholic, the Russian Orthodox, and the Islamic cultures in close proximity. More to it than that, but that’s a decent shorthand
  7. I’m a one issue guy right now. I realize not everyone is. If someone supports Ukraine but is otherwise reprehensible, I’m all “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Not saying that’s the case with McCaul. It’s just a general observation. The one thing i’ll say I get irritated about regarding McCaul and people like Graham, is that there’s some famous Congressional unfunded mandating going on here. I’d like it a lot more if instead of making noises about ATACMS and F-16s - which is well and good - how about funding them? it’s going to be very challenging getting a supplemental spending bill regarding defense and Ukraine spending in the HOR passed. The Senate is ready to do it on a bipartisan basis. McCarthy and company need to get their shit together. I mean, in a lot of ways, but again, I’m a one issue guy. I mean, let’s not default on the debt while we’re at it, too, but outside of funding continuing obligations, nothing is as important to me as giving Ukrainians a legitimate opportunity to break away militarily from centuries of Russian fuckface domination, to escape this genocide, and return to 2014 borders.
  8. NATO/US doctrine is built upon air superiority. NATO would not be running this offensive without first waging a long (and expensive in terms of destroyed aircraft) campaign to wreck enemy radar installations and ground to air missile launchers. Then they'd bomb the bejeezus out of the enemy positions to soften it up. Then they'd have close combat support from an array of planes and helicopters. They'd launch offensives in unpredictable places with special forces to flank the enemy. Especially to take vital assets like bridges and regional air strips. They'd probably have an amphibious landing. Think about how different the images would be if wings of F-22s, F-35s, Apaches, Blackhawks etc. were littering the sky. Instead Ukraine has to rely on untrained and older troops recently mobilized who have never been anywhere near these types of vehicles, depending on artillery and drones to provide a tiny fraction of what air power would for NATO forces, and then only do it with 12 brigades. And while NATO/US have the ability to build more top of the line vehicles as replacements, Ukraine has to rely on continued generosity and political will for the 40 year old scrap heap extras laying around. What Ukraine and its soldiers and citizenry are trying to accomplish is very brave. They're going straight into the lion's den. Being shocked at pictures of destroyed NATO armor is asinine.
  9. I'd argue how serious we ever got. We got serious enough, and that's all that matters, but there was some tiptoeing through the tulips even at the end of it. On some level there were some thoughts that was a European issue, and they should take the lead, but has been noted by multiple analysts over the decades, Europe really relies on US leadership to get anything done. Honestly I'm shocked it hasn't erupted into something since then. The Serbs even seem to be leaning to the West lately. Never thought I'd see that. Don't know what to make of it, or where it all ends up, but I'm glad to see it in any case.
  10. Whisper those sweet nothings in my ear, baby.
  11. Zelensky has been railing against the Red Cross and UN, but they’re in the same predicament. If Russians insist on artillery attacks against civilian staging areas you can’t expect aid agencies to go in there. If this was anyone but Russia (or China) NATO/US would likely be sending troops to temporarily secure the area so aid organizations can operate. They’re just a bunch of fuckheads. Always have been. Always will be.
  12. Allegedly there are 6 defensive lines. It’s categorized as the most heavily fortified area in the southern region. So much so there are a ton of cheerleader analysts for Ukraine who think an offensive in that direction is just flat out dumb. I don’t agree. I don’t see how someone can know unless they’ve walked those fortifications, they know the quality and number of the personnel deployed there, and what the artillery, ammo, air support, and heavy armor availability is. And you discover that by making probing attacks to see how the enemy responds. I sure would be excited by a pending encirclement of Tokmak, I know that. But we’ll see. Don’t want to get my hopes up just yet. I want to mentally let Ukraine do their thang, whatever that may be. But refresh gets a bit worn out at times. Not going to lie.
  13. That's not how an independent media operates, and you can't expect them to do differently. Now saying that, anyone that isn't a tool of the Russian propaganda machine either directly or indirectly that has a couple of synapses firing in their heads should be able to come to the conclusion Russia did it. I did that night. You could look at the devastation and know that came from a demolition from the structure itself. Since then there's been all kinds of confirmation. There's a seismic tracker that recorded an explosion in the area at 2am. There are eyewitnesses who saw no evidence of shelling or missile fire. There were Russian forces confiscating any type of flotation device on the left bank in the occupied areas in the weeks leading up to the demolition. There were Russian military stationed outside occupied villages who fired on the population when they tried to evacuate. There was Russian shelling of evacuation centers. There were numerous other smaller dams detonated across occupied areas. There's the fact that Russians are historical cock suckers who place no value on human life, either their own, and certainly not on anyone else's. But that doesn't change there's going to have to be a smoking gun for mainstream media sources to say Russia did it. I went through a lot of this back in 2014. I knew it was Russian special forces that orchestrated the beginnings of the separatist movement. You could see them on video being recorded live by individuals peaking through their window with cell phones. I knew that the Russian army crossed the border, encircling and annihilating Ukrainian forces who were wiping the floor with the separatists. There were eyewitness reports from people in the Ukrainian paramilitary groups who saw it. But the media had to go along with the charade it was separatists in the Donbas region who spontaneously organized themselves as a protest against a Russian friendly president being kicked out with a Nazi friendly far right group taking power through a coup. All of it was absurd. So sure, I hope no one tries to play that game on here. I haven't seen any sign of it. But to expect news organizations who ostensibly should be neutral parties rather than rooting sections flatly state it was Russia who did it without being able to cite a source beggars belief.
  14. No offense, but I don't see where D-Day is all that relevant of a comparison, other than the date, and one side was on offense while the other was on defense. The fact is Ukraine only has 12 brigades they've formed made up of new western armor (and by new, I mean 40 years old). Many of the people in those brigades are newly mobilized. They have no industrial capacity to replace any losses. They have to go hat in hand for every single vehicle. There aren't any more Leopard 2A4s or better forthcoming. It's all Leopard 1s from what I can see, and the 31 M1 Abrams are older models that come with their own supply chain issues. They have no real close combat support. Both the planes and helicopters fly nape of the earth tactics and practically fling their air to ground missiles blind. The storm shadows are different because they can be fired at a safer range, but those aren't close combat support in any case. They certainly have no paratrooper capability, nor robust amphibious assault assets much beyond inflatable rafts. Unless the Russians show a discernible weakness in their lines at some point - and I'm personally convinced they will - it's going to be tough sledding. The assault teams will take a few meters. Support teams will then secure the area. Artillery will reposition. Rinse and repeat. Through minefields, entrenched positions, artillery fire, and against a more robust close combat air support. Oh, and across flat land with little topographical changes and limited cover of any sort. Which is both a strength and a weakness, but certainly leaves assault teams naked on approach. From what I've read Ukraine is concentrating on taking strategic heights from which they can mount more attacks. In the Bakhmut region they're using veteran forces still utilizing their older equipment, and having success to the tune of 1.5 to 2 kilometers of advancement. Now, we also have huge fog of war issues, so who knows how up to date anything we're getting about the attack really is. But I do feel like it's safe to say we're not seeing any kind of Kharkiv style breakthroughs so far. Nor should we have expected any. I feel extremely confident we haven't seen a wholesale "all in" type of attack, but we may not, either. This may be what the offensive looks like. I don't believe that, but I do understand a certain reluctance by Ukrainian command in committing assets that are very difficult to replace, in terms of both man and machine. And remember, the Kherson offensive, while successful, apparently took a huge toll on both equipment and men. It could be we'll see a repeat of that offensive. I hope not. I hope they're able to achieve a breakthrough somewhere along the southern front that leads to a jail break. But anything which demonstrates this doesn't have to settle into an attritional war is a huge success in my opinion. So we'll see how it goes.
  15. Here's one of the better assessments I've seen of what's going on. Obviously short on specifics, and the guy admits he's parsing through a lot of Russian disinformation. But while he's pro Ukraine he's not rah rah. I've had mixed feelings about some of The Drive's reporting. I just don't know what to think of them so far, other than they're trying the best they can at making a living doing what they're passionate about. In any case, here's the article. Tons of twitter links so you can go further down the rabbit hole if you so desire: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/ukraine-situation-report-offensive-brings-claims-of-limited-breathroughs
  16. People upset regarding media reports the collapse of the Kakhovka dam is being blamed by both sides on one another. Which IS absurd, but that's how it's always been. Until there's some kind of official word that can be cited, some authoritative source for what happened, this is how it goes. It's obvious to any thinking person that Russia blew up this dam by mining it then purposefully detonating it, but we have to go through this charade. But I don't blame thinking people who feel like giving both sides of the issue equal credence is absurd. It is. But it's also just how things are. The truth will come out eventually. Until then you have to do what is necessary to come out victorious.
  17. Heartfelt message from a soldier in Bakhmut: "Birthday, In the war, if you come out of the meat grinder, it's already your birthday. And this happens many many times. If, of course, you are lucky. Only for yesterday's storm, there were several moments when I should not have lived to see my birthday. It was bloody.... I watched so much...every time it's like a new one. I'm not used to it. The worst thing is that when you are exhausted, it is difficult to to resist stress. The surrounding horror breaks through the defenses of the psyche, penetrates and fills you. When you are extremely exhausted, and can't [sic] standing on your feet...but there are many wounded fellows around, and they need to be saved, and then taken out of here. And at this time, shells are exploding next to you...nearby flashes of fire are blinding. The air is permeated with iron fragments and bullets...and you realize that you yourself will now be wounded or die.... The realization that the tattered and unrecognizable body is your brother with whom you have gone through so much....screams, shelling, explosions, and chaos....you are lost orientation in space.... Every time I am more and more surprised by the soldiers of Ukraine. These are incomprehensibly cool people who voluntarily go to hell. Thank you to everyone who put me on my feet, pulled me out of battle, who supported me during the war. And especially those with whom I have the honor to fight side by side together." This is a Ukrainian sniper. He has a number of videos and interviews with western reporters on his twitter page, along with images of when he was wounded in the fighting and then returned.
  18. I have no idea regarding the veracity of this tweet. Could be images from months ago for all I know. But I want to believe:
  19. I'd like to say you're not going to believe this...but Russia.
  20. Different perspective from a Sweden writer talking about the training the Ukrainians went through with the CV90. It bothers me that the writer calls them tanks, but that's okay. Apparently all the trainees were older men, according to the article. I wonder if that's because they were considered the most competent for the training, or it was in part to give them duties as infantry which didn't require as much physical exertion. Probably a combination of the two. UAF can't afford to send people they don't have a high confidence in that can follow the training and apply it on the battlefield. Especially with the more advanced heavy weaponry, which the CV90 is. Also interesting they're sending a model with an upgraded armor package. https://www.forsvarsmakten.se/en/news/2023/06/ready-for-the-front/
  21. The kid they dropped the water bottle to on the roof of his house with a drone was saved along with his family. The video doesn't have a translation, but the story is plenty damn cool in cyrillic, too, even though I can't read it.
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