War in Ukraine


They always report "intense fighting" but it's rarely captured on film.
Most people don't risk taking videos of bullets going by. Some journalists have already died trying (or even trying not to).
I've seen some footage of dead soldiers lying somewhere, once the fight ended. But not too often.
Do you really see footage of fighting in other wars? In many I see nothing, in others I see kind of propaganda documentaries where
the journalist follows along with the tropps and there's more footage of troops travelling and preparing than actual fight.
But I don't like videos so much, specially so gore. I mostly read news, so maybe it's just me.
This time the media is also paranoic of broadcasting fake news, so they double check everything they find in social media,
because sometimes people mislabel footage of other wars or whatever. So most homemade videos of fighting can't probably be vetted and stay out of TV.
It's usually just a lot of rockets and buildings bombed to hell.

It's mostly buildings destroyed. The bombing itself is rarely recorded as well. I find it logical.

(I don't consider getting bombed fighting).
I'd do. I think. But that's splitting hairs. I don't really know, but do you mean nowadays fighting gets personal any more?. It's not like Roman or medieval wars where people went one on one with swords and lances and all (there were also arrows thrown, and war machines, burning, or what not, it's even said Archimedes burned ships from shore with mirrors, but it was mostly melles and running up and down the hills). I think today its lots of mortar, missiles and they use machineguns basically on civilians (or maybe soldiers runnning away from a destroyed tank or vehicle or something). There're often not even soldiers from both sides, just some soldiers and some drone or missile. So I don't think it needs to look like a video game, I don't know.
Do you consider a tank bombing another tank fighting?
Suspect Ukrainian casualties far outweigh those of Russia. But we don't want hear this. Indeed it would be counterproductive.
If you mean civil casualties I don't think even Ukranians know how many, let alone telling it. A house is bombed, and you don't know how many corpses lay under the debris if any until you clean it, if you have even time and resources for it. I don't mean Ukranians aren't trying to keep records of how many die and who they are, but I wouldn't be surprised if they couldn't and in some places it can't really be their first priority.
If you mean the military, well, they might know. But I think there are lots of groups trying to defend Ukraine: army, defense guards, volunteer groups, foreign volunteers/mercenaries, etc. Every village gets some villagers and sets up checkpoints. I'm not sure they're all enlisted somewhere, maybe the leaders of each checkpoint or something like that, but others may be just neighbours. Normal citizens could have been giving arms and might fight spontaneusly, Others may be civilians, but have made some Molotov coktails. I don't know. So maybe counting how many of the dead count as military is not that easy.
Ukranians say they killed 15000 Russians (today I read killed or injured?). At the beginning of the war Ukraine even set up a web site where Russian mothers could look up names of soldiers to see if they were found dead or captured or what. But I don't know if that's still online, it didn't look very legal. And even if it's up, why should one believe it ?
Western estimates where around 7000 (dead, not counting injured from what ? just satellite imaginery?).
Russians said fewer than 500 dead, but that was at the beginning of March.
Today the BBC said it had collected between 500 and 600 burials in Russia of Russian soldiers, officers, etc. But that was only from memorial notifications, condolence notices or so, so they may miss many. And I'm not sure the Russians declare their soldiers dead until they have very solid evidence of who they are. If a soldier goes missing it might be lying dead somewhere, be in an Ukranian hospital, be lost alone somewhere and come back later, have been captured or have defected. If some other soldier saw it dead and got back to his base, or gets safe enough to communicate, he can report it, but sometimes they don't, I don't know.

So it's a little like the demostrations, when organisers say 10000 attended and the police says 500. I even remember a song (by Ix I believe, called something like "ven a mi mani").
In the song a boy invited a girl to the demonstration saying "come to my demo, baby. According to the police we'll be hundreds, according to organizers, thousands, but for me it'll be just you."

I really don't know how the armies or wars work.
 
They always report "intense fighting" but it's rarely captured on film. It's usually just a lot of rockets and buildings bombed to hell. (I don't consider getting bombed fighting). Suspect Ukrainian casualties far outweigh those of Russia. But we don't want hear this. Indeed it would be counterproductive.
While I've seen footage of fighting, it probably is best to watch the part with the rockets and bombed buildings. It's horrible enough to understand what is happening, but way less intimidating then people getting shot.
My guess is that you're probably looking for footage in the wrong places. Youtube buries this kind of footage or completely filters it out, which I guess is most suitable for the majority of the viewers that don't actually want to see those images.

I also think that there will be a lot of casualties and both sides won't admit that probably, as it's bad optics.

Fuel in Germany is not becoming overly expensive because oil become more expensive.
It's the companies which increase their margin because people THINK oil is getting more expensive.

Blue: - Oil price + tax
Red: - What oil companies earn

View attachment 37895
I guess they'll take a certain margin as earnings and if you look at it like that they actually decreased:

Price - Earn - Earn percentage
1.694 - 1.310 - 77.3%
1.867 - 1.440 - 77.1%
2.242 - 1.548 - 69.0%
2.314 - 1.528 - 66.0%
2.316 - 1.504 - 64.9%
2.305 - 1.461 - 63.3%
 
What a dick. This hurts foss most of all.

Most people don't risk taking videos of bullets going by
Yes they do all the time. We see reporters rushing out as bombs blast in the background. They want the exclusive footage.

Do you really see footage of fighting in other wars?
I think so yes. Afghanistan, Iraq ... But these are American wars which of course are better televised (monetised).

I guess they'll take a certain margin as earnings and if you look at it like that they actually decreased:
Ha ha.

-> It seems the Russians are on track to annex Ukraine. Our best hope at this point seems to be economic sanctions.

And at what point do economic sanctions hurt enough to start ww3?
 
I think so yes. Afghanistan, Iraq ... But these are American wars which of course are better televised (monetised).
I remember the gulf war (the fight for Kuwait), and then we only saw the onboard feeds from missiles, and perhaps some things from boats I can't remember now. The second time they went, after Afghanistan, we got some footage of convoys in the move, but that's about it as far as I recall. Certainly I'd never seen anyone shot in those wars until they dramatised it for film.
And at what point do economic sanctions hurt enough to start ww3?
Well they caused WW2. They gave Hitler reason to build up his army and start invading countries, and probably gave people reason to vote him in in the first place. It took a good twenty years from the end of WW1 to the start of WW2, but russia already has a warmonger for governer, so maybe a bit shorter.
 
President Biden says cyberattacks from Russia could be coming soon. I still remember when the Colonial pipeline went down for like two weeks due to a ransomware attack. Hopefully we aren’t about to go through that again.
 
Ransomware doesn't look like it's coming any day now, thanks to some of the Revil crew getting arrested, and the Conti team having all of their dirty laundry aired in public over the past week or so. I dunno if it works the same as politics though, so whether the lack of those two teams means there's a vacuum which sucks in all the hackers to form new crews and go on the rampage, I can't really say.
 
Well they caused WW2. They gave Hitler reason to build up his army and start invading countries, and probably gave people reason to vote him in in the first place. It took a good twenty years from the end of WW1 to the start of WW2, but russia already has a warmonger for governer, so maybe a bit shorter.
As far as I understand (little) this has only symbolic significance, but WWII hasn't ended yet. Russia and Japan were about to sign WWII peace but Russia withdrew after Japan retired its most prilieged trade status (basically low tariffs) in protest for Ukranian war. Now Japan summoned Russian envoy to complain about they not signing peace.
 
Ukranians say they killed 15000 Russians (today I read killed or injured?). At the beginning of the war Ukraine even set up a web site where Russian mothers could look up names of soldiers to see if they were found dead or captured or what. But I don't know if that's still online, it didn't look very legal. And even if it's up, why should one believe it ?
Western estimates where around 7000 (dead, not counting injured from what ? just satellite imaginery?).
Russians said fewer than 500 dead, but that was at the beginning of March.
Today the BBC said it had collected between 500 and 600 burials in Russia of Russian soldiers, officers, etc. But that was only from memorial notifications, condolence notices or so, so they may miss many. And I'm not sure the Russians declare their soldiers dead until they have very solid evidence of who they are. If a soldier goes missing it might be lying dead somewhere, be in an Ukranian hospital, be lost alone somewhere and come back later, have been captured or have defected. If some other soldier saw it dead and got back to his base, or gets safe enough to communicate, he can report it, but sometimes they don't, I don't know.
To mess it up more: Yesterday a Russian news website posted a number between 9000 and 10000 for Russian dead soldiers, claiming to come from a Russian Defense Ministry briefing. The article is now gone and the paper says it was hacked content.
 
As far as I understand (little) this has only symbolic significance, but WWII hasn't ended yet. Russia and Japan were about to sign WWII peace but Russia withdrew after Japan retired its most prilieged trade status (basically low tariffs) in protest for Ukranian war. Now Japan summoned Russian envoy to complain about they not signing peace.
I don't know about Russia withdrawing, at the end of the war they invaded Japan and beat the army. That and the fact the US had just bombed the country twice with atomic bombs, caused Japan to surrender. With Japan surrendered and Hitler dead, seems pretty clear WW2 is over now. There might be other trade relations left over from it, but at the very least the fighting was over.
 
I don't know about Russia withdrawing,

Sorry for my English. I didn't mean Russia withdrew troops in WWII. I just meant that Russia was now, in 2022, going to sign a peace agreement with Japan, and then decided not to sign. So it withdrew from signing peace now, not withdrawing from making war back in 1945.
at the end of the war they invaded Japan and beat the army. That and the fact the US had just bombed the country twice with atomic bombs, caused Japan to surrender. With Japan surrendered and Hitler dead, seems pretty clear WW2 is over now. There might be other trade relations left over from it, but at the very least the fighting was over.
Sure. But I guess there was a written declaration of war and no written peace agreement (remaining disagreement over Kuril islands), so the end of war paperwork is missing. I meant just that.
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The only one who knows the true death toll is FB.
which FB? Facebook ? why ?
 
I know I shouldn't laugh on the death toll, but can I on the propaganda war about the death toll ?

The BBC reports that now USA is saying there may be 10000 Russians dead and 40000 disabled.
The last they had said was 7000.
It's either they hacked the Russian news website to make it kind of credible, or the propaganda moguls
in Washington were ashamed that the death toll they fabricated was even lower than the actual number leaked from Russia
and had to one up it somehow.
50000 soldiers out of combat is a lot. I think, before the war, reports were that some 120000 troops were assembling near the border.
Add some 15000 Chechens and some 15000 Syrian mercenaries or so, who came later and it'd mean the Ukranians got rid of 1/3 of
the invading troops already (or Russia is sending many more troops than reported). I can hardly believe it.

Now I can't help imagining a secret plot in Ukraine: They really only killed some 1000 Russians and then they took 9000 soldiers who defected and agreed to report them as dead and give them a new identity so their families could get some pension. I'm imagining that character (Leclerc) in "allo allo" who pitifully disguised himself and produced false passports for the British aviators hiding with French resistance in occupied France, only that the resistance leader comes and says (only once, she won't repeat). "we now need 9000 false identities. Try to make them credible". And then Rene with a dismal face says "No way I can host so many people here!".
 
Well you still need to feed troops and to pay their wages, so it seems reasonable to me to equate time to cost. There will be a certain cost to russia for dead troops, certainly to the families of those dead troops, but it's close to nothing for Putin until he approaches something like an entire generation being wiped out, which isn't close to happening yet.
 
I was just thinking web services might be able to infer the death toll. Dead people generally don't logon. It's imperfect but could indicate the magnitude, are we closer to 2k (as reported) or 200k.
But facebook is losing users globally, and people don't usually cancel their accounts (I hear it's difficult), simply stop using it, like they would have died. Facebook might still track them through cookies, beacons, and whatnot, but maybe it's not that easy to detect when they die or when they grow tired of facebook and install adblockers? Facebook knows family members you didn't know you had or knows someone's pregnant before she knows, so maybe it knows who's dead, but maybe not if that's not so profitable... (I bet they sell dead users to advertisers as if hey were alive, so they may want not to know...).
In any case facebook was banned in Russia, so maybe not the best to know about dead Russian soldiers.
And finally, let me play Gorgias: Facebook doesn't know, if it knew it wouldn't tell, and if it told we wouldn't believe it.
 
the journalist follows along with the tropps
Embedded Journalism.

As far as I understand (little) this has only symbolic significance, but WWII hasn't ended yet. Russia and Japan were about to sign WWII peace but Russia withdrew after Japan retired its most prilieged trade status (basically low tariffs) in protest for Ukranian war. Now Japan summoned Russian envoy to complain about they not signing peace.
Officially Netherlands is still German territory as it was never given back. (because of a law that government is always in the territory and our government fled to England, thus auto-surrendering the territory to Germany).
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I was just thinking web services might be able to infer the death toll. Dead people generally don't logon. It's imperfect but could indicate the magnitude, are we closer to 2k (as reported) or 200k.
Reminds me of China, where disconnected phones were closely correlated to estimated Corona Deaths, because the official deaths was way below that.
Similar here, if every Ukranian citizen has a phone, that data could be correlated.
 
Ukraine gets to use Clearview for free.

Lets hope it gets rolled out in all of Europe and terrorists can no longer walk the streets, go to the supermarket or use public transport! Although some others prefer a build in microchip, which will also help identify terrorists. In either case: win-win!
 
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