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With the end of the Russian winter offensive in Ukraine and the knowledge that Ukraine will soon begin their counteroffensive, why doesn't Russia just give up now?
Elena Gold



The widely advertised “mighty Russian winter offensive” turned out to be greatly exaggerated.

Russian troops barely advanced: Only 0.04% more of the Ukrainian territory was added to occupied areas after 3 months of continuous effort – at the cost of 60,000 lives of Russian soldiers.

The constant screams of Russian propagandists about western tanks arriving to Ukraine, as well as armor-piercing munitions to destroy Russian tanks, gave their results: Conscription offices, which were given the task to recruit high-quality motivated conscripts, who wouldn’t be crying and recording videos for Putin, begging to not be sent into a battle, citing poor preparation and ammunition, are realizing that Russians only support Putin’s “special military operation” if the battle is on TV and have no actual desire to find out how effective are Ukrainian HIMARs.

Russian TV propagandists even started talking about the need to “stop scaring viewers” with stories about the amount of weapons that Ukraine is getting from its allies.


Russian soldier named Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin (a full namesake of a famous Russian poet) was captured by Ukrainian defence forces.

Alexander said that he was mobilized from his home town of Khabarovsk (“Boli” on Chinese maps). His whole regiment refused to go into a battle. 2 of the guys ran away.

Alexander refused to fulfill commander’s orders and was sent to “shtrafbat” (penal battalion), and sent into a battle anyway. After 2 days at the front, he was captured by Ukrainian forces.


Alexander is lucky to be alive. Russian troops accumulate 600–1,200 KIA daily.

Alexander and his team realized that fighting for Putin was pointless.
But Putin and his gang of goons refuse to admit that they are sending Russians to die in an unwinnable war.

Even Putin’s elites have realized that Putin lost the war and destroyed Russia’s economy and future. But they still are afraid to say it publicly out loud, as the recent scandal with the leaked tape of Iosif Prigozhin showed.

The close circle of “grandfathers of the war”, aged 70+ (Putin, Patrushev, Kovalchuk brothers, Shoigu, Bortnikov, Zolotov, Sechin, Chemezov) realized that they will lose power if lighten the grip – and possibly their lives.


So, Putin responds to the new challenges – the arrest order by the International Criminal Court, the leaked tape calling him “inept Lilliputian”, president Xi’s refusal to supply Russia with lethal arms – by trying to escalate externally and tighten the bolts internally:

• Kremlin stated that Vladimir Putin visited occupied Mariupol – for the first time ever, since 2014, Putin visited occupied Donbas. By doing it in civilian clothes while Ukraine announced martial law, Putin effectively made himself a legitimate military target (during war, only the military are under Geneva conventions protection, but civilians of the country-occupier are not covered; by visiting occupied Donbas, Putin waved his right to a diplomatic cover as the head of state).

• Several tough sentences for anti-war posts in social networks: 5 years in prison to a 56-year-old disabled man who is looking after a disabled son; 7 years in prison to a 62-year old archeologist. Just for a social media post.

• Announced his intent to place nuclear missiles in Belarus by July 2023.

• Arrest of an American journalist, US citizen Evan Gershkovich (reporter of The Wall Street Journal) in Yekaterinburg on accusations of “spying”.

WSJ journalist Evan Gershkovich.
U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, after the arrest of Gershkovich, called on the Americans remaining in Russia to "immediately leave" the country.

Journalist Jason Corcoran said he was getting threats about his own reporting in Russia.

Corcoran was the first western journalist who interviewed Alexei Navalny in 2011. He was already talking about corruption in top echelons of power and his desire to run for president.

Navalny was poisoned by prohibited chemical agent Novichok in August 2020 (the same poison was used by Russia in Salisbury, UK, in 2018, and killed a UK citizen and inflicted damages to others). He survived only by a series of miracles:

• pilots took an emergency landing;

• the ambulance immediately arrived to the plane with required medicines;

• he wasn’t re-poisoned in the hospital while in coma;

• after a few days, he was allowed to leave Russia (personally by Vladimir Putin) for a treatment — definitely thought to never be able to get out of coma;

• influential Russians booked a charter plane from Germany to take him and paid for doctors;

• the German doctors managed to revive him and he woke up after weeks in coma;

• he managed to rehabilitate without major health issues.
A Russian oppositional blogger and Moscow politician Elvira Vikhareva was recently poisoned.


She experienced severe stomach pain, increased heart rate and numbness of the limbs. Then she started to have convulsions, fainting, as well as hair loss.

For a long time, Elvira was going from one doctor to another, who couldn’t figure out what was wrong with her. Finally, after months of tests, a highly toxic carcinogen, potassium dichromate, was found in Vikhareva's blood.

In private, reporters told Elvira that 3 other women and 1 man were poisoned in Russia and had similar symptoms; the women emigrated, the man died.

Vikhareva said she doesn’t want to leave Russia. She believes she was poisoned because of her anti-war position, but she doesn’t want to run away.
Putin’s gang of criminals made sure to smear everyone with the blood of Ukrainians by making people publicly agree to the “special military operation in Ukraine” – under the threat of 15 years in prison for “discrediting Russian army”, reserved for those speaking against of bombing Ukrainian cities. Those who say nothing are now being targeted, on suspicion of being against the war, and demanded to approve “the special operation in Ukraine”.

Meanwhile, in the city of Yasny, Orenburg Region, former Wagnerian ex-prisoner Vladimir Shestakov was pompously buried as a “Russia’s hero”.

The obituary said, "we will always remember his courage and bravery in the name of the peaceful future of the Fatherland."

In 2018 Shestakov was sentenced to 18 years in prison for the murder of the 5-year-old son of his girlfriend.

During the investigation, Shestakov told in detail how he had beaten the child while drunk. The boy started jumping on the couch, drunk Shestakov reprimanded him. The child did not obey him, then Shestakov began to beat him up, and then threw him on the floor in the corridor. The boy's mother tried to protect him, but Shestakov hit her as well. An ambulance was called for the child only in the morning, when the boy began to wheeze. The doctors were unable to save him.

For telling this story, a Russian police can arrest you and beat you up, steal cash and things from your apartment during the search, and you may be sentenced for up to 15 years in prison for “discrediting Russian army” – more, than the child killer served in prison before Vladimir Putin pardoned him and sent to Ukraine, to kill Ukrainians.

In Chelyabinsk region, parliamentarians proposed to pardon detainees on criminal offenses before their case is heard in the court, if they agree to go fight in Ukraine. Why waste government’s time and money, if the accused can be simply ejected to Hunger Games?

Wives of Russian KIA are taking photos in their military jackets with medals.
“Relatives of heroes” the poster says. Kids used to say, “My dad is an engineer”, “My dad is a truck driver,” now dads are just “heroes”. The cult of death at its finest.

Putin’s gang with its war is not just pushing Russia to a dead end, but to a graveyard.

Russia is crashing.
It’s inevitable by now.

እኛ ኤርትራዉያን የመሃልና የመስመር ዳኞች፡ ለጀግናው የዩክሬን ህዝብ ከነጀግናው መሪያቸዉ ትልቅ ክብር እንሰጣቸዋለን!

ጀግናው ዘለንስኪ ባያነሳ ጋሻ፡
በቦረቀ ነበረ አውሮፓ ላይ ራሻ።

ወራሪ ከሰሜን ይምጣ ከደቡብ ከምስራቅ ይምጣ ከምዕራብ ወራሪ ነው፡ በህዝብ ትግልም ይሸነፋል![ አራት ሚሊየን ነጥቦች]

“ክሬሚያ ሆይ ብረሳሽ ቀኜ ትርሳኝ!” ቀኜ ትርሳኝ” እያለ ነው የኣውሮፓው ሻዕብያ፡ ዘለንስኪ ጀግናው!

Who was Vladlen Tatarsky, the Russian blogger killed in an explosion today?
From CNN's Radina Gigova, Mariya Knight, Tim Lister and Taras Zadorozhnyy

Vladlen Tatarsky is seen in this undated social media picture. (@Vladlentatarskybooks/Telegram/Reuters)

A well-known Russian military blogger, Vladlen Tatarsky, was killed in an explosion at a cafe in St. Petersburg on Sunday, authorities said.

There are several prominent bloggers like Tatarsky who cover Russia's war in Ukraine for followers on online platforms like Telegram. Some have amassed followings of hundreds of thousands of people.

While Tatarsky was ardently pro-war, he also issued criticism of setbacks in Moscow's campaign — a fairly rare phenomenon in the Russian public sphere.

Background and combat experience: Tatarsky's real name was Maxim Fomin.

In 2014, he fought with Russian separatists against Ukrainian nationalists in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, according to Russian state news agency Vesti, citing public sources.

Tatarsky created his Telegram channel in 2019, naming it in honor of the protagonist of Victor Pelevin’s novel “Generation ‘P,’” according to Vesti. He went on to write several books.

Tatarsky supported the war in Ukraine. He gained popularity online by providing analysis and commentary during Russia's invasion.

Rare criticism: Tatarsky had more than half a million followers on Telegram, and while he was aggressively pro-war, he was sometimes critical of Russian setbacks in Ukraine.

Public criticism of Moscow's war is uncommon in Russia.

In May last year, he told CNN that he was not criticizing the overall operation, rather “individual episodes,” and that he still believed Russia would achieve its goals in Ukraine.

Nevertheless, he called for broad change in response to the halting progress of Moscow's invasion.

“All the areas need to be improved,” he said. “Each war reveals some drawbacks, shortcomings, or false experiences, experiences that need to be adjusted to the modern realities. So absolutely all spheres need reform."

Tatarsky gained prominence after attending a Kremlin ceremony that marked the annexation of four Ukrainian regions (a move dismissed as illegal under international law by Ukraine and Western allies).

Little is known about the St. Petersburg blast, but Russian and Ukrainian officials quickly voiced suspicions

No official evidence has yet been presented about who carried out the deadly attack at a St. Petersburg cafe Sunday, but officials in both Russia and Ukraine have already suggested they know who was behind the attack.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said it was an example of growing threats against Russian journalists on the part of the Ukrainian government. She claimed Russians face "threats of reprisal from the Kyiv regime."

Zakharova decried Western countries and international organizations, who she said had not expressed "elementary human sympathy" since Tatarsky's death. And she said the blogger had provided invaluable information about what was happening in Ukraine, making him "dangerous" and "hated" in Kyiv.

(Zakharova's claims come days after American journalist Evan Gershkovich was detained in Russia on espionage charges, which the US and his employer — the Wall Street Journal — have dismissed as false.)

A Ukrainian presidential official, meanwhile, suggested the killing was due to in-fighting in Russia.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky's office, wrote on Twitter: “Spiders are eating each other in a jar. Question of when domestic terrorism would become an instrument of internal political fight was a matter of time.”

Digital Weyane wrote: ↑

01 Apr 2023, 05:48

.. .. .. ዉይ ዉይ!