What is the Rush?

Take it easy, big guy!

Can anyone explain to me why Kiev has to attack Russia soon? I mean, I believe Strelkov and Prigozhin when they say it is coming and I’m locked in for an attack by June 1st as part of a prediction I made all the way back in winter. But, I’m just wondering aloud here and genuinely confused. I even brought this up with Nikolai Mikovic the other day.

Why rush the attack?

And now, even Zelensky, who was gung-ho about attacking, has come around to this line of thinking!

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has said his country needs more time to launch a much-anticipated counter-offensive against Russian forces, as its military awaits the delivery of promised military aid.

The expected attack could be decisive in the war, redrawing frontlines that, for months, have remained unchanged. It will also be a crucial test for Ukraine, eager to prove that the weapons and equipment it has received from the West can result in significant battlefield gains.

Speaking at his headquarters in Kyiv, President Zelensky described combat brigades, some of which were trained by Nato countries, as being "ready" but said the army still needed "some things", including armoured vehicles that were "arriving in batches".

"With [what we already have] we can go forward, and, I think, be successful," he said in an interview for public service broadcasters who are members of Eurovision News, like the BBC. "But we'd lose a lot of people. I think that's unacceptable. So we need to wait. We still need a bit more time."

Actually, if there were a case to be made for a disinfo play being made, it would be Zelensky’s above statement. We will see soon. Either way, time is on Ukraine’s side in every single way except possibly one.

Think about it: with every passing day, they get more weapons and training and even reinforcements in the form of NATO private citizen volunteers. Their entire country is subsidized by the West and every single day that this arrangement continues is a day that huge cartloads of money get stolen by Western and Ukrainian politicians never to be seen again. The only time constraint might be China, if the US is serious about confronting them over Taiwan and switching focus to there.

Meanwhile, Russia’s oligarchs’ profits are bleeding out into the chernozem from the steep drop-off in revenue coming from natural resources sales.

Reuters:

Russia's federal budget revenues from oil and gas, the lifeblood of its economy, fell 64% in April from the year-earlier period and declined by 5.9% from March, the finance ministry said on Thursday, as a result of higher subsidies to oil refineries.

Budget income from oil and gas sales reached 647.5 billion roubles ($8.3 billion) last month, compared to 688.2 billion in March and 1.798 trillion roubles in April 2022, it said.

Subsidies from the budget to the refining companies from the oil reverse excise tax rose by 38 billion roubles to 79.3 billion roubles in April, while the same payments to oil refineries under the "damping mechanism" rose to 107.2 billion roubles from 96.7 billion roubles in March.

At the same time, profit-based tax revenues from oil producers fell last month to 185.4 billion roubles, from 220.6 billion roubles in March.

The Russian finance ministry plans to halve subsidies to oil refiners from July 2023, and is aiming to cut payments from the budget under the damping mechanism by 30 billion roubles.

Russia's mineral extraction tax (MET) and export duty revenues rose in April from March by 6.5%, or 36.4 billion roubles, and by 13.5%, or 6.8 billion roubles, respectively.

The budget for 2023 foresees a deficit of 2% of GDP. The finance ministry has budgeted for a 23% reduction in oil and gas revenues this year to 8.95 trillion roubles.

($1 = 78.3000 roubles)

But, wait, there’s more.

GIS Report:

The upshot is that Russia’s revenues from oil and gas exports tumbled by nearly 40 percent in January 2023 ($18.5 billion) compared to January 2022 ($30 billion). The revenue decline will be even steeper in the coming months, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has predicted.

Targeting Russian energy makes sense because it accounts for roughly 18 percent of Russia’s gross domestic product (GDP) and at least a third of its state budget revenues. Yet despite the loss of revenue, the damage to the overall economy remains surprisingly slight, at least according to official numbers, which some question.

Russia’s GDP shrank to an estimated $1.5 trillion, or 2.1 percent, in 2022. The 2023 forecast ranges from no growth (+0.3 percent), according to International Monetary Fund projections, to a 5.6 percent decline, based on the estimate from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. But some critics say that the Russian government’s concealment of official data is masking deeper problems.

Thanks to my commenters who shared the relevant links with me! I read your feedback, for better or for worse.

But this criticism can be applied to more than just the Kremlin’s crooked economy figures. Clearly, it applies to Russia’s military potential as well. It is shocking to see Russia’s army in such shambles. Clearly, when Shoigu and Gerasimov were busy looting the military over these years, they made sure to be extra thorough and also fired plenty of officers up and down the ranks to make sure that not one shred of competency remained in the structure.

“What about Syria?” You ask.

That was Wagner. And Prigozhin explained to us that the MoD did more harm than good there as well. We’ve covered this already, so do try and keep up. The MoD also did nothing when Israel refused to stop bombing Syria despite Russia’s red lines. And nothing when the whole pilot incident with Turkey occurred. Why? That’s a topic for another time. Soon, soon.

Oh, Georgia before that was a shit show too! The situation there was saved at the last minute by elite units taking matters into their own hands and Saakashvili choking under pressure (on his tie).

But all the same problems - communications, coordination, incoherent orders from command, they were visible then and nothing was done in the last 10+ years, clearly, to address them if Russian soldiers are getting sent Chinese children’s walkie-talkies and the difference being pocketed by deputy ministers in the MoD.

Prigozhin often tells us that Wagner has been buying time for the Russian army to reorganize itself after a series of defeats. But, the truth of the situation is that nothing has been done this whole time, again. It is clear that someone does not want Russia to win this war and this someone or someones live in Moscow, not Kiev or Washington … but they may have property in London.

So, Kiev has all the time in the world to prepare itself, because, much like in the 8 years after maidan, Russia is not preparing for what comes next while its enemies are. Again, this is because of what appears to be deliberate sabotage by people with power in the Kremlin.

Is Putin to blame for this? Apparently, some of the commenters are convinced that I am being paid by Putin to not criticize him. This is not true, but I am open to the idea. The deal that I am offering the Russian spooks is the following: for $1000 a month, I will promote your narrative. And for $2000 a month, I simply won’t write anything at all. However, once I secure my $1000 a month, by the start of June, hopefully, I will raise my rate. I will also extend the same offer to Western spooks, only I demand double, as a fee for me having to swallow my disgust for the gay tranny stuff you guys are pushing on the world.

Also, if my readers don’t want me to sell out, maybe they ought to stop moralizing at me from their 401k high horses for having a paywall in the comments section and actually just fork over the 50 bucks a year I ask for. Quelle horror, I know. No, but a few cranks aside, the optimates have really risen to the occasion after my last Slavland Chronicles appeal, and snark and sarcasm aside, I’m actually very grateful for the support. Thank you. And no, I won’t sell out. I live a simple life and the things that I pursue in this life don’t require much money. You can’t buy discipline, for example. Anyways, once my bag is secured, I will stop shaking down my readers every other post. You have my pledge, OK?

So pony up, pay me, and all will be well.

**

Look, on some level, I do get that the rouble does indeed stop with Putin, and as CEO of Russia Inc. he does indeed share a large portion of the blame for staffing his government with absolute cretins. That being said, Putin made a hard decision and pulled the trigger and went for the jugular a year ago. If the Kiev coup had worked, we would all be singing his praises as a modern-day Bismark, Machiavelli, Sun Tzu, Jesus and Hitler figure all wrapped into one. But, because his FSB and his MFA and his MoD are so incompetent and even treacherous, it didn’t work, so that’s why we’re in this position now.

Still, I admire Putin’s willingness to roll the dice on occasion.

Also, I think/hope that Putin understands that he is as good as dead if things keep going this way. That means that if there is anyone who would be motivated, you would think, to get it together and pull through, it would be Putin. What prevents Putin from doing what needs to be done, however, is Putin himself. He has built his power base on an interlocking network of alliances and blackmail. This is better than in the West, mind you, where the networks appear to be built on sexual blackmail, probably around molestation rituals involving underage boys. But Putin can’t or won’t fire Shoigu because they’re old friends and linked at the hip. The same applies to the people in Shoigu’s network as well, one level down. This seems to extend to all levels of the Russian government and economy.

Stability was achieved in Russia at the cost of competency and, well, any semblance of Russian patriotism, clearly.

Anyways.

The continued Not-War makes no sense now. There is no way that Russia can win fighting the way that they are fighting now i.e., by not mobilizing more men, releasing/buying/creating more supplies and restructuring the command. At this point, the only question is how much Russia is going to lose going forward and how bad the peace deal, if one is offered to them, will end up being.

I don’t think Russia should end the war, mind you because this means a return to an even worse status quo than before. Also, a full loss or surrender means that an even worse satrap elite will take over. The ideal scenario has always been that the war would lead to positive, long overdue changes within Russia among the ruling caste and Russia’s policy of constantly selling out to the West being revised. From the very early days of this blog to today, I hold out hope against all odds that this will occur, somehow.

Like literally all the angry patriots in Russia, I’d much rather see reforms as opposed to a revolution.

**

The Russians in Belgorod recently sent out an SOS appealing to Prigozhin to save them. Not to Shoigu. Not to any other general and not to any other politician, their local mayor and governor included. Not to Putin, even. And that is a big deal for a Russian peasant. Usually, the appeals are directed to the Tsar, which, well, you get what I’m hinting at here, I hope. Prigozhin showed up and heard out their complaints, which, were just as bad as anything that Wagner was alleging, only it came from local militias who had been abandoned and left to fend for themselves by Moscow.

Here are some highlights from his visit to Belgorod:

• Prigozhin asks them, “so, what are your thoughts. The truth comes from the bottom.”

• We have no status and we are given practice weapons, for which we need 10 signatures, and the bureaucracy watches us like hawks

• We are not allowed to use our own vehicles to get in and out of bases ??? [more complains about insane bureaucratic controls controlling when people are allowed to sneeze or go no. 2 basically]

• “We have many men who are ready and willing to organize a self-defense,” but the bureaucracy stops them and harasses these locals for some reason

• Prigozhin: “so they want you to wait for the Ukrainians to attack you with DRGs.”

• We have no rights or status, we just wear combat fatigues, the authorities have no faith in us and give us no power.

• “We are not idiots, though.”

• No luck with any appeals through official channels

• Prigozhin: “Rublevka says that no attack is possible, but we know this isn’t true.” He is interrupted by the locals who say, that the Ukrainians already attack them regularly. They enter and leave Russia with impunity.

• Thanks given to Wagner, specifically, for help and for providing them with real guns.

• Fin

If it weren’t for the media blackout on Wagner in Russia, Prigozhin would be beating out Shoigu, who gets wall-to-wall positive coverage and still lags behind Wagner.

As for the Belgorod meet and greet, I wonder if this is all not just part of a brilliant psy-op by Shoigu to convince Ukraine to attack Belgorod and then Moscow eventually, as part of a great moral trap that Kiev will blunder into. Yes, we must see through the 5D kayfabe judo at work here! I can see Lavrov up there on the podium in a few weeks saying, “You see, we told you that they were Nazis, and now they have marched on Moscow, just like the Nazis did. Check and mate. Also, did you know that Hitler had one testicle and gassed my grandfather 14 times? I thought so.” *mic drop* and then a cut over to Ritter on Channel 1 smugly chuckling about how 88 Ukrainians die for every one Russian soldier. “Doesn’t Kiev understand that they have already been judo-slammed into submission?” *cut to the Seinfeld soundtrack*.

As an aside, it is indeed a dark kind of funny to see Ritter on Russian state media now, as part of his book tour? in Russia. The man gets his news from Russian state media, and then repeats it on Russian state media, which gets to say that the Americans think that Russia is winning.

In other words, the worm has well and truly turned full circle and started eating its own butt now.

Another symptom of being on the losing side and losing decisively, is the in-fighting coming to a head among the various fiefdoms that constitute the Russian armed forces. Anastasia Kashareva, the doll-faced and duck-lipped Moscow socialite-divorcee turned war reporter, shared an inside scoop on the state of the infighting on the Russian side along the Bakhmut front gathered from listening to gossip during her time over there.

Does this sound like a serious army or one that is tearing apart at the seams?

Rhetorical.

**

To be fair, there is a fair share of bad news coming from the Ukrainian side as well. General Zaluzhny, apparently, might be in bad favor. I could see a scenario where there is political pressure to attack now, but cooler heads are saying that waiting is favorable for Ukraine’s odds of success. He didn’t attend a NATO military meeting the other day and the Z-people are saying that he was killed in a recent Russian strike.

Disfavored and ducking out of meetings with his bosses or dead - those seem like the two sensible explanations to me. Also, because Zaluzhny does not have an Israeli passport like most Ukrainian politicians do, I could indeed see a scenario where the Kremlin felt comfortable taking him out.

Meanwhile, his counterpart, who, if rumors are to be believed, is still in favor, is apparently alive and well and being featured in the Ukrainian media spotlight.

From what I understand, Syrsky is the guy that would launch an unprepared attack if told to do so, whereas Zaluzhny would be the guy pumping the breaks. If, for one reason or another, Zaluzhny is out of the picture, then we ought to expect the attack sooner rather than later.

Speculations aside, and having acknowledged that both sides have their fair share of problems, the the key takeaway is that Russia will continue losing for the foreseeable future because for all their problems, Ukraine has been pushing Russia back and not the other way around.

Yes, even in and around Bakhmut, where Prigozhin came out and claimed that 500 Russians were killed and 3 km lost in a day, which was confirmed by the Ukrainian side the next day.

The only real question is how slowly and how painfully this process will unfold and whether or not this will lead to changes on the home front. That is really the topic that interest me the most at the end of the day and that is what always differentiated me from the other war bloggers from day one. I was only forced into covering the war, dragged into it, actually, because there was nothing to report on the Russian home front, where reforms stuttered out by summer, much like the offensive. I never believed that this was a war fought for the purposes of “denazification” and never really got excited by the videos of dead Ukrainians (or Russians for that matter) but by the more important, larger questions surrounding the fate of the Slavlands going forward.

Even if no counter-attack occurs and the Russians manage to hold on to their gains, this whole adventure ended up being a disaster on literally all counts for literally everyone. The average Ukrainian peasant is extremely stupid and has let himself get lathered up into a frenzy by state propaganda and deranged women into fighting a stupid and costly war. The consequences of this war will be felt for generations to come because of the number of dead, the bad feelings that it has engendered towards Russians and Belarussians, the selling out of the country, the damage that has been incurred, the takeover of the country, the continued integration with the West, and the solidification of the Human Rights Freedom Oligarchy ideology for which these chumps fought and died for.

I am under no illusions about the rulers of Russia though, mind you. Ukraine being reincorporated into Russia would not automatically lead to a future of prosperity and happiness for generations to come. I would, however, argue that Russia’s oligarchs are less rapacious and that Russia is less criminal than Ukraine overall, which would be an improvement for the average Ukrainian. But, even if I am wrong, and no improvements were to be felt, it still would not be worth fighting and dying over. Most Ukrainian soldiers were conscripted and fight for money and because they have to, but I literally cannot put myself into the shoes of anyone who is ideologically committed enough to volunteer to fight Russia to the death. And, to be fair, there are indeed many people like this all over the FSU, including Russia.

**

I argue for the political unity of the Slavlands simply because a disunity can always be exploited and turned into a full-blown war. If, for example, Europe were able to unite before having been conquered by America more than a century ago, they might have been able to chart their own course and not have been racked by nonstop wars which eventually exhausted the European powers, killed off the elite, and led to their eventual capitulation and occupation. They were prevented from doing so on multiple occasions by outside powers and by the scheming of the RCC. The resulting centuries of nonstop warfare in Europe have been the result of Europe not being able to unify into one political entity. America, in contrast, was able to become a consolidated superpower because they were able to keep the in-fighting contained. If, however, the South had triumphed and broken free of the North, outside powers would have been able to exploit the situation and North America would have been racked by wars, as opposed to the relatively peaceful existence that the continent has enjoyed.

Now though, Russia will have a South or North Korea on its borders for the foreseeable future.

In other words, Russia, the only slavic power capable of uniting the Slavlands, has failed to achieve a lasting political unity and the internal peace that this would entail for the foreseeable future. Russia and Ukraine will now exhaust themselves in a grinding war that only America, China and the other powers will benefit from.

Washington and London and Tel-Aviv have won yet another round and prevented the possibility of a 200 million strong slavic competitor re-emerging on the world state.

I see no reason why they wouldn’t relax, take their time and savor their victory.

After all, what is the rush?