The War in Ukraine

47 watchers

Northern Exile 19 Oct 9:44pm, 19 Oct 2025 11,360 posts	Quote Pin Northern Exile I'm intimately acquainted with the Tomahawk missile. I have slept next to one for several weeks at a time, they make incredible heatsinks if you're inclined to cuddle one.
richmac 19 Oct 10:09pm, 19 Oct 2025 37,676 posts	Quote Pin richmac I'll settle for not being on the wrong end of one!
Northern Exile 19 Oct 11:10pm, 19 Oct 2025 11,361 posts	Quote Pin Northern Exile Wise
richmac 20 Oct 7:02am, 20 Oct 2025 37,683 posts	Quote Pin richmac So, the RN use them, so I'm guessing my guessing that there isn't really an alternative is right enough?
Northern Exile 20 Oct 9:10am, 20 Oct 2025 11,363 posts	Quote Pin Northern Exile Oh most definitely, have been for over 20 years. They're the tube-launched variant, so fired from a torpedo tube and then break the surface at velocity, shedding the canister as they do.
Muttley 2 Nov 8:28am, 2 Nov 2025 4,524 posts	Quote Pin Muttley Interesting article about how Putin has ended up the way that he has: archive.ph
richmac 2 Nov 8:48am, 2 Nov 2025 38,067 posts	Quote Pin richmac Very convincing read. The bit about COVID was interesting and the pic of him with the soldier to, the iconography in the background, trying to use a version of the past. The bit about Putin has essentially betrayed the Russian idea of peace for service is also interesting. The change has to come from the people though, everyone in power in Russia is scrambling to maintain things as they are.
richmac 8 Nov 11:05am, 8 Nov 2025 38,272 posts	Quote Pin richmac bbc.co.uk Watch Hungary now become a major exporter of oil safety Trump undermines everyone else who's genuinely trying to end the war
Northern Exile 14 Nov 9:12am, 14 Nov 2025 11,408 posts	Quote Pin Northern Exile Nightly, for months now, Ukraine’s cities have been pounded by relentless aerial attacks. In addition to its grinding and attritional ground offensives in the east and south of the country, since early summer, the Russian military has greatly expanded its air offensive against centres of population, looking to collapse morale and undermine the Ukrainian people’s will to fight on. And as winter approaches, so those aerial bombardments have targeted Ukraine’s power infrastructure. Repeatedly in recent weeks, whole cities have been plunged into cold darkness as power plants, transmission lines and regional and local substations are damaged or destroyed. Rolling power outages are now common, reportedly lasting up to 14 hours in some cases. So the latest political scandal to hit the government of Volodymyr Zelensky could hardly have come at a worse time for his country. And to make matters worse, it revolves around Ukraine’s energy industry. Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies this week released the findings of Operation Midas, an 18-month probe into Energoatom, the state-owned operator of all of Ukraine’s nuclear power plants, investigating allegations of bribes and kickbacks said to amount to US$100 million (£76 million). Raids were carried out around the country and seven people have been arrested. What makes this so dangerous for Zelensky is that one of the people named in the probe is a former business partner of his. Businessman Timur Mindich was the co-owner, with Zelensky, of Kvartal 95 Studio – the platform on which the Ukrainian president made his name as a comedian before he entered politics (ironically, under the circumstances, as an anti-corruption candidate). Mindich is reported to have left the country, but he is said to have connections to several senior government ministers. The scandal risks tainting the already embattled Zelensky government by association. What’s worse, as Stefan Wolff and Tetyana Malyarenko explain, is that only a few months before this scandal exploded, Zelensky tried to bring Ukraine’s independent anti-corruption agencies under the direct control of his government. He backed down in the face of huge demonstrations, but this latest corruption scandal is likely to weaken him further. He has already lost his justice minister, German Galushchenko, and energy minister, Svitlana Hrynchuk. And, as Wolff and Malyarenko point out, the last thing Zelensky needs while his European allies debate how to raise desperately needed funds to keep fighting is a whiff of corruption surrounding his administration. Having spent the day debating how to raise the huge amounts of money Ukraine will need in 2026, it appears that the EU is closing in on a preferred option. The European Commission considered two main options. One plan is for either the EU to borrow €140 billion (£124 billion) using its long-term budget as collateral. Another is to use the frozen Russian assets as collateral for a loan to Ukraine, to be repaid after the war if Russia pays reparations to Kyiv. An idea floated by Norwegian economists to use Norway’s €1.8 trillion sovereign wealth fund to guarantee the loan was quickly scotched by the country’s finance minister, former Nato secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg, who said that while Norway was happy to contribute, it could not be responsible for the entire amount. The next move will be to assuage the fears of Belgium, which is where the assets are held by securities depository Euroclear, that a successful legal challenge by Russia could leave it liable for repayment. The Kremlin has already made noises to this effect. Veronika Hinman, the deputy director of the University of Portsmouth’s military education team, believes that while the massive injection of funds will certainly enable Ukraine to continue to fight, it’s unlikely to be decisive. “It cannot deliver the manpower, weapons or morale,” she writes. Hinman describes the fairly dire situation on the battlefield, where Russia is slowly but surely beating back the defenders outside key cities such as Pokrovsk and Huliaipole. The invaders continue to press for a breakthrough in these strategically important towns, which would allow them to make a push into central Ukraine. Russia has been unsuccessfully trying to capture both Pokrovsk and Huliaipole for many months (its troops briefly entered Huliaipole on March 5 2022, only a couple of weeks after the invasion started, and were pushed back). But the fight appears to be increasingly lopsided, writes Hinman. Russia may have lost more than a million troops – killed or injured – but it has huge reserves and its retooled war economy appears to be bearing up reasonably well, despite US sanctions. So the need for more money from the EU grows ever more critical, Hinman writes. But she worries that “in the end, this latest wave of aid may buy Ukraine time – but it’s unlikely to deliver victory”.
Muttley 14 Nov 12:36pm, 14 Nov 2025 4,565 posts	Quote Pin Muttley The corruption scandal is hugely damaging, especially as it concerns the energy and defence sectors. I mean really, wtf did those guys think they were up to at a time like this? Not so much corruption but treason. That said, the fact that the anti-corruption agencies are very publicly on the case at least shows that there are some checks and balances. Civic society does work, to a degree. But it doesn't look good that last summer Zelensky tried to take control of those same agencies -- he backed down in the face of huge public protests, another sign of a functioning civic society. The Russians are making hay, as you'd expect, with all the hypocrisy you'd also expect.

About This Thread

Maintained by Northern Exile

Please feel free to post anything of consequence, links to reports, analysis, ways in which we can support the people of Ukraine. Not a forum for bashing the UK government, the politics thread is a good place for that.

Royal United Services Institute - rusi.org
Bellingcat - bellingcat.com
Human Rights Watch - hrw.org
Reuters - reuters.com
BBC Russian Service - bbc.com
Ria Novosti - ria.ru
Russian Online TV - ontvtime.ru
Russian TV News - tv-novosti.ru
UK Government Response - gov.uk
UK MOD Twitter Feed - twitter.com
ABC News - abcnews.go.com
Wion Russia - Ukraine - wionews.com

Related Threads

Helping Refugees Apr 2022
🇺🇦 Ukraine Red Cross - a way WE can help. Mar 2022

ukraine

Report This Content

You can report any content you believe to be unsafe. Please let me know why you believe this content is unsafe by choosing a category below.

Thank you for your report. The content will be assessed as soon as possible.

The War in Ukraine

About This Thread

Related Threads

Report This Content

Tag A User

Free training & racing tools for runners, cyclists, swimmers & walkers.