Ukraine War Watch Thread

[Vector]

[caltrek]

Human Rights Watch Urges Accountability as Evidence of 'Devastating' Ukrainian Landmine Use Mounts
by Brett Wilkins
June 30, 2023

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) After gathering fresh evidence of the Ukrainian military's continued use of internationally banned antipersonnel landmines in their battle against Russian forces that invaded in early 2022, Human Rights Watch on Friday reiterated calls for Kyiv to stop using such weapons and hold anyone who has done so accountable.

Earlier this year, HRW documented Ukrainian homeland defenders' repeated firing of rockets scattering internationally banned antipersonnel mines last year "in and around the eastern Ukrainian city of Izium," a region occupied by Russian invaders.

HRW said Ukraine's launch of thousands of PFM-1 'petal' or 'butterfly' mines resulted in 11 verified civilian casualties, including one death and multiple lower leg amputations.

"These antipersonnel mines have had immediate and devastating consequences for civilians in and around Izium, including by tearing off limbs of residents as they go about their daily lives," Ida Sawyer, the director of HRW's crisis and conflict division, told The Washington Post on Friday.

The Ukrainian government has vowed to investigate the military's use of such inherently indiscriminate weapons that are banned under the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty, to which Ukraine is a signatory.

Read more here: https://www.commondreams.org/news/ukraine-landmines

[Time_Traveller]

[caltrek]

The article below is a little bit too much of Putin as the helpless victim. If Russia was drawn into a war, it was their own stupidity in being drawn into such a trap. Other options were available. Options that would not have the dire consequence on the Russian population in the Ukraine that an invasion has created, and not just because of Ukrainian military measures. Options that could have affirmed the interests of Russians in the Ukraine.

Still, the article does present an interesting perspective, one that should not be simply shrugged off.

Has America Just Destroyed a Great Empire?
by Michael Hudson
June 30, 2023

Introduction:

( Counterpunch) Having organized a coup d’état in Ukraine in 2014, the United States sent its NATO proxy army eastward, giving weapons to Ukraine to fight an ethnic war against its Russian-speaking population and turn Russia’s Crimean naval base into a NATO fortress. This…ambition aimed at drawing Russia into combat and depleting its ability to defend itself, wrecking its economy in the process and destroying its ability to provide military support to China and other countries targeted for seeking self-dependency as an alternative to U.S. hegemony.

After eight years of provocation, a new military attack on Russian-speaking Ukrainians was conspicuously prepared, ready to drive toward the Russian border in February 2022. Russia protected its fellow Russian-speakers from further ethnic violence by mounting its own Special Military Operation….

A byproduct of this confrontation with Russia has been to lock in America’s control over its Western European satellites. The aim of this intra-NATO jockeying was to foreclose Europe’s dream of profiting from closer trade and investment relations with Russia by exchanging its industrial manufactures for Russian raw materials…

In addition to having to subsidize domestic European gas to prevent widespread insolvency, a large proportion of German Leopard tanks, U.S. Patriot missiles and other NATO “wonder weapons” are being destroyed in combat against the Russian army. It has become clear that the U.S. strategy is not simply to “fight to the last Ukrainian,” but to fight to the last tank, missile and other weapon being deleted from NATO stocks.

This depletion of NATO’s arms was expected to create a vast replacement market to enrich America’s military-industrial complex…

Read more here: https://www.counterpunch.org/2023/06/3 ... at-empire

[caltrek]

Biden Administration Considering the Supply to Ukraine of Banned Cluster Bombs
July 1, 2023

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) The Biden administration is considering providing Ukraine with cluster bombs and may announce this decision in early July, NBC News reports.

“We have been thinking about DPICM for a long time,” Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Friday at the National Press Club. “Yes, of course, there’s a decision-making process ongoing.”

Dual-purpose improved conventional munitions (DPICMs) are surface-to-surface warheads that burst and disperse deadly multiple, smaller bomblets over a wide area. Many bomblets fail to explode on initial impact, leaving duds that can indiscriminately wound and kill, like landmines, for many years.

DPICMs can be fired from the U.S.'s howitzer artillery systems already provided to Ukraine. Ukraine has asked the U.S. for DPICMs since last year, but the idea has met resistance.

Over 120 countries, including 23 NATO countries, ban them under the Convention on Cluster Munitions treaty.

Read more here: https://www.commondreams.org/news/bide ... ter-bombs

U.S. Cluster Munition Coalition Letter to Biden

Wednesday, June 14, 2023

Dear Mr. President,

We, the undersigned organizations, write with grave concerns over the potential transfer of United States cluster munitions to Ukraine. We sincerely appreciate your Administration’s firm stance in not transferring any U.S. cluster munitions to Ukraine to date. Despite recent calls from members of Congress and Ukrainian leaders for the United States to transfer cluster munitions to Ukraine, we strongly urge you to remain steadfast.
The U.S. Cluster Munition Coalition condemns in the strongest possible terms the use, production, transfer, or stockpiling of cluster munitions by any party. Cluster munitions are among the most harmful weapons to civilians, as they are designed to disperse indiscriminately across a wide area and often fail to explode on initial use, littering communities with unstable unexploded ordnance and causing devastating harm to civilians, and especially children, years after a conflict ends.

Cluster munitions have been used repeatedly by the Russian military since its full-scale invasion in February of 2022, with devastating impacts on civilians and civilian objects, including homes, hospitals, and schools, according to Human Rights Watch. The Ukrainian military has also used cluster munitions on multiple occasions. On April 8, 2022, a cluster munitions attack by Russia killed at least 58 civilians and injured over 100 others in the city of Kramatorsk—this is just one of the hundreds of documented, reported, or credibly alleged, cluster munition attacks in Ukraine since the 2022 invasion. The United States must not be complicit in the use of these indiscriminate weapons.

Any claims of potential tactical benefits of the transfer and subsequent use of cluster munitions by Ukraine in the defense of its territory, dismisses both the substantial danger that cluster munitions pose to civilians, and the international consensus on their prohibition.

Were the United States to transfer these prohibited weapons, it would run counter to the global consensus, embodied in the 123 countries who are signatories or states parties to the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which bans the use, production, transfer, and stockpiling of these weapons. While neither the Russian Federation, Ukraine nor the United States are party to the Convention, 23 NATO members are among the state parties. Beyond making the United States a global outlier, acting in contradiction to partner nations’ and NATO allies’ express ban on the transfer and use of these weapons could hurt the U.S.’ ability to forge and maintain coalitions that have been so crucial to supporting Ukraine. It would also harm efforts to promote other arms control agreements.

Although the United States is regrettably not party to the Convention, a long-standing congressional mandate prohibits the transfer of any cluster munitions with a failure rate greater than 1%, which effectively forbids the transfer of any existing U.S. stockpiled cluster munitions. Additionally, twice in the past year, members of Congress have written your Administration calling for the United States to “be leading the global effort to rid the world of these weapons, not continuing to stockpile them” and urged you to “promptly order a review of U.S. policy on cluster munitions with the goal of halting their use, production, export, and stockpiling and putting the United States on a path to join the Convention on Cluster Munitions.” We urge your Administration to continue to heed this congressional mandate and intent.

Cluster munitions are indiscriminate weapons that disproportionately harm civilians, both at the time of use and for years after a conflict has ended. We greatly appreciate your committed stance against transferring these weapons while supporting the Ukrainian people – and we urge you to remain resolute in resisting recent calls.
Sincerely,

(Thirty-eight organizations are listed as signatories to this open letter).

Source: See link provided above this quote box.

[caltrek]

Zelenskyy: 'The War Is Not Over' Until Ukraine Retakes Crimea
by Brandon Gage
July 3, 2023

Introduction:

(Alternet) Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CNN's Erin Burnett in an exclusive Sunday interview in Odesa that Russian President Vladimir Putin's response to the Wagner Group's failed June 24th mutiny was "weak" and that a peace deal with him is impossible so long as Russia maintains its occupation of the Crimean Peninsula.

"We see Putin's reaction. It's weak," Zelenskyy remarked of how Putin handled the private military company's aborted march on Moscow.

"Firstly, we see he doesn't control everything. Wagner's moving deep into Russia and taking certain regions shows how easy it is to do. Putin doesn't control the situation in the regions," Zelenskyy continued. "All that vertical of power he used to have is just crumbling down."

After briefly reflecting upon his relationship with Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns, Zelenskyy affirmed his commitment to liberating Crimea from Russia, which illegally annexed the region in 2014 and thusly considers it a part of its territory.

"We cannot imagine Ukraine without Crimea. And while Crimea is under the Russian occupation, it means only one thing: the war is not over yet," Zelenskyy declared, adding that "it will not be victory" unless Ukraine reclaims Crimea.

Read more here: https://www.alternet.org/the-war-is-not-over/

caltrek’s comment: I hope Zelenskyy is just posturing and that negotiations can result in him backing down from this position in exchange for other concessions. I can’t see Russia agreeing to this unless they are totally defeated on the battlefield. Even then, it would be a great humiliation that would be a matter of long-standing resentment. As I understand it, Crimea is and was inhabited largely by ethnic Russians. It is one thing to assert Ukrainian identity in the face of Russian aggression, quite another to insist on control of territory largely of Russian cultural orientation.

[firestar464]

FINALLY SOMEONE WHO GETS IT

[raklian]

This seems to be the strategy the Ukrainians are following against the heavily-fortified Russian defenses in the slow-moving counteroffensive.

[raklian]

caltrek’s comment: I hope Zelenskyy is just posturing and that negotiations can result in him backing down from this position in exchange for other concessions. I can’t see Russia agreeing to this unless they are totally defeated on the battlefield. Even then, it would be a great humiliation that would be a matter of long-standing resentment. As I understand it, Crimea is and was inhabited largely by ethnic Russians. It is one thing to assert Ukrainian identity in the face of Russian aggression, quite another to insist on control of territory largely of Russian cultural orientation.

I don't think Zelensky is posturing at all. Zelensky knows signaling concessions to end hostilities between the nations will not assuage Baltic nations' justified fear Russia won't stop its expansionist efforts to accommodate Putin's vision of a reunified U.S.S.R. at some point in the future. That is going to create more problems than it solves, at least on the European side. As long as Ukraine is getting steady economic and military support from the West, it will remain emboldened to try retaking the land Russia occupied after 2014. The message they're trying to tell Russia is that any attempts to take another nation's sovereign territory, even in which a majority of the people sympathize with Russia, will be met with severe consequences. That's where things stand at the moment.

[caltrek]

caltrek’s comment: I hope Zelenskyy is just posturing and that negotiations can result in him backing down from this position in exchange for other concessions. I can’t see Russia agreeing to this unless they are totally defeated on the battlefield. Even then, it would be a great humiliation that would be a matter of long-standing resentment. As I understand it, Crimea is and was inhabited largely by ethnic Russians. It is one thing to assert Ukrainian identity in the face of Russian aggression, quite another to insist on control of territory largely of Russian cultural orientation.

I don't think Zelensky is posturing at all. Zelensky knows signaling concessions to end hostilities between the nations will not assuage Baltic nations' justified fear Russia won't stop its expansionist efforts to accommodate Putin's vision of a reunified U.S.S.R. at some point in the future. That is going to create more problems than it solves, at least on the European side. As long as Ukraine is getting steady economic and military support from the West, it will remain emboldened to try retaking the land Russia occupied after 2014. The message they're trying to tell Russia is that any attempts to take another nation's sovereign territory, even in which a majority of the people sympathize with Russia, will be met with severe consequences. That's where things stand at the moment.

The bottom line seems to be that this war is going to drag on for some time to come. An ongoing tragedy.

[caltrek]

Patriot Kill Marks Hint That It Downed Aircraft Inside Russia
by Howard Altman
July, 4 2023

Introduction:

(The Drive) The Ukrainian Air Force on Monday released a video that appeared to include a tacit claim that one of its donated Patriot air defense systems downed several Russian aircraft on May 13, a day when Moscow lost at least four and possibly five aircraft within its own borders.

The video was released in conjunction with the celebration of the Anti-Aircraft Missile Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Day, one of many such honors Ukraine holds for its troops. In one shot, there are images of two Russian fighters and three Russian helicopters emblazoned on the side of a Patriot battery. The three helicopters and two jets have the date May 13 inscribed underneath.

A screen capture of the Ukrainian Air Force video shows images of three Russian helicopters and two Russian fighters painted on the side of a Patriot air defense battery. The three helicopter and two jet images bear the date May 13.
Defense Industry of Ukraine image

Read and view more here: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/ ... de-russia

[weatheriscool]

[raklian]

caltrek’s comment: I hope Zelenskyy is just posturing and that negotiations can result in him backing down from this position in exchange for other concessions. I can’t see Russia agreeing to this unless they are totally defeated on the battlefield. Even then, it would be a great humiliation that would be a matter of long-standing resentment. As I understand it, Crimea is and was inhabited largely by ethnic Russians. It is one thing to assert Ukrainian identity in the face of Russian aggression, quite another to insist on control of territory largely of Russian cultural orientation.

I don't think Zelensky is posturing at all. Zelensky knows signaling concessions to end hostilities between the nations will not assuage Baltic nations' justified fear Russia won't stop its expansionist efforts to accommodate Putin's vision of a reunified U.S.S.R. at some point in the future. That is going to create more problems than it solves, at least on the European side. As long as Ukraine is getting steady economic and military support from the West, it will remain emboldened to try retaking the land Russia occupied after 2014. The message they're trying to tell Russia is that any attempts to take another nation's sovereign territory, even in which a majority of the people sympathize with Russia, will be met with severe consequences. That's where things stand at the moment.

The bottom line seems to be that this war is going to drag on for some time to come. An ongoing tragedy.

Yes, it's a war of attrition. The side that can no longer replenish its manpower and equipment at the rate it can sustain a front without collapsing will be defeated. It's probably US and Europe's strategy by sending weapons and economic aid to Ukraine without directly engaging with Russia.

[weatheriscool]

Russia Using Chemical Weapon During Bakhmut Artillery Bombardments, Ukrainian Official Claims
Source: Kyiv Post

Russian forces are using chemical weapons against Ukrainian troops, a spokesman for the Ukrainian Defense Forces has claimed.

Col. Oleksiy Dmytrashkivsky said that following an artillery strike against Ukrainian positions near the Donbas city of Bakhmut, soldiers showed symptoms including nausea, vomiting and, in a few cases, loss of consciousness.

“During the artillery bombardments they use a chemical called lewisite,” Dmytrashkivsky said in a video posted on social media.

Ukrainian chemical warfare specialists were still evaluating evidence and identification of lewisite as the chemical weapon used was preliminary, Dmyrtrashkivsky said.

Read more: https://www.kyivpost.com/post/19108

[caltrek]

Chinese Social Media Platform Presents False Report of Non-existent U.S. Media Claim of CIA Support of Wagner Group
by Zhuang Jing and Rita Cheng
July 6, 2023

Introduction:

(Radio Free Asia via Eurasia Review) Following the Wagner Group’s short-lived insurrection in Russia last month, several verified users of the popular Chinese social media platform Weibo claimed that the Russian mercenary army had accepted US$6.2 billion from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. The users cited the Los Angeles Times as the source and circulated screenshots of the purported article in their posts.

Asia Fact Check Lab (AFCL) found this claim to be false. The LA Times published no reports on a U.S. allocation of funds to the Wagner Group.

The article that has been circulating actually reports on a $6.2 billion surplus in U.S. military funds that is expected to be sent to Ukraine, and does not mention the Wagner Group. The Weibo posts include an erroneous Chinese-language translation of the original article’s English-language headline and a photo of the Wagner Group’s leader that is not present in the original report.

Read more here: https://www.eurasiareview.com/06072023 ... nalysis/

[funkervogt]

Russia captures British Storm Shadow missile.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/c ... sian-hands

[caltrek]

Cluster Bomb Opponents 'Appalled' by Biden Decision to Send Banned Weapons to Ukraine
by Jake Johnson
July 7, 2023

Introduction:

(Common Dreams) President Joe Biden has reportedly given final approval for the transfer of U.S. cluster munitions to Ukraine, ignoring warnings from human rights groups and progressive lawmakers who underscored the indiscriminate weapons' devastating impacts on civilians immediately upon use and far into the future.

According to The Washington Post, a drawdown of the globally deplored weapons from Pentagon stocks is set to be formally announced on Friday. The U.S., which has used the weapons around the world, is believed to possess more than 3 million cluster munitions containing over 400 million submunitions.

More than 120 countries have signed the United Nations Convention on Cluster Munitions, which prohibits the use or stockpiling of the weapons. But the U.S., Russia, and Ukraine have opposed global efforts to ban the weapons, which are notorious for failing to explode on impact and littering landscapes with what are effectively landmines.

Human Rights Watch (HRW), which urged the Biden administration not to transfer the weapons to Ukraine, has documented the use of cluster munitions by both Russian and Ukrainian forces since the start of the war last year.

The Cluster Munition Coalition, a global civil society campaign working to eradicate the weapons, said it was "appalled" by the U.S. president's approval of the transfer to Ukraine.

Read more here: https://www.commondreams.org/news/bide ... er-bombs

caltrek’s comment: We are losing the war in that we are becoming more and more like what we started out fighting against.

[firestar464]

Biden has violated both international and domestic law

[caltrek]

Biden has violated both international and domestic law

Apparently, so has Russia.* Still, IMHO that does not excuse the U.S. or the Ukraine from going down that same path.

*https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/05/29/clu ... kraine-war

[raklian]

Biden has violated both international and domestic law

What international and domestic laws has Biden broken? The ban on the use of cluster munitions has more to do with voluntarily signing the Convention on Cluster Munitions treaty which is not the same as a law. Neither Russia nor U.S. are signatories to this treaty.