The sinking of Russian Black Sea warships is attributed to failure of the fleet’s top command
Admiral Viktor Sokolov has resigned. New safeguards are expected to be put in place, as specified in the following article.
Translation with my notes in bold and in [brackets]
Mar 7, 2024
MILLIONS OF RUBLES BURNING: DOES THE RUSSIAN FLEET HAVE A CHANCE TO SURVIVE? WE HAVE GOOD AND BAD NEWS
(Your air strike update for Mar 7, 2024 directly follows this report)
Let us recall the incident with the Magura V5 drones (the situation is indicative), and also calculate how much the enemy will need the “help” of the allies to attack Russian targets.
Great Britain allocated a targeted tranche to Kiev to fight our Black Sea Fleet. Meanwhile, relatively recently, Russia lost three warships. Experts explained what needs to be done to prevent the enemy from achieving his goal.
Attempt to attack the Crimean Br
Thus, yesterday, the patrol ship Sergei Kotov was attacked by a flock of Magura V5 maritime drones. Only five naval drones took part in the attack, and, alas, all scored hits.
The sixth, aerial, drone later discovered and eliminated the Russian Guard Mi-8 helicopter. Apparently, the operator of the sixth drone was waiting for an opportune moment to attack the tugboats that had begun the rescue operation and were trying to drag the damaged corvette to the port. By morning, when the Kotov began to sink, another group of three Ukrainian drones approached the scene. But they were shot with machine guns from tugboats. As far as one can judge, the enemy’s plan assumed that the first large group of unmanned boats would attack the patrol ship and thereby make a hole in the security perimeter, and the second group would enter it and try to attack the Crimean Bridge.
Note that the cost of one Magura V5 marine drone is 273 thousand dollars. Thus, the 200 million pounds allocated by the British will be enough to purchase 931 drones of this type.
If the calculation, for example, was based on the fact that “six drones per ship” were allocated, then London sponsored 155 group attacks. And each of which will most likely end in the death of our ship. [If it is discovered, serendipitously, that the drones are being launched directly from a NATO country, then Russia could actually be at war with NATO or at least with the country that sent the drones across the Black Sea. NATO is definitely playing with fire]
The enemy can attack with fewer drones, but then the likelihood of the ship being destroyed is reduced.
At the same time, not all the money allocated by the British will go to the purchase of drones: part of the amount will go to pay for logistics and other overhead costs. Maybe the same amount is used to pay for the flights of NATO aircraft coordinating the attacks, but maybe not. In any case, cutting 30% of the support cost subsidy seems a reasonable assumption. Consequently, there remain a hundred attacks paid for by the British.
"The simplest and most effective"
Judging by open source data, there are still quite a few ships left in the Black Sea Fleet. Speaking of large warships, the situation is as follows: the 11th brigade of anti-submarine ships includes the patrol ships Ladny and Pytlivy, as well as the frigate Admiral Makarov. His classmates “Admiral Essen” and “Admiral Grigorovich” went to the Mediterranean Sea before the start of the special operation and are not taking part in the fight for the Black Sea.
They are accompanied by the corvette Mercury.m which was built by the Northern Shipyard and handed over to the fleet in July 2023, which is why it was unable to get to its duty station (after the start of the special operation, Turkey, in accordance with the Montreux Convention, closed the passage of military vessels through the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits). Read more about this in the long report [not yet translated but you can use Google Translate] by Tsargrad.
A competent source Tsargrad reported that, according to his assessment, even taking into account the latest losses, the Black Sea Fleet retained at least 75% of its combat potential.
There is an opinion that all valuable ships must be withdrawn beyond the effective range of unmanned boats. The docking areas must be closed with engineering means to prevent the penetration of naval drones into the bases. After which we will seriously begin to re-equip the ships.
Experience has shown that the simplest and most effective is to equip them with a large number of turrets with large-caliber machine guns or small-caliber cannons. To detect BECs, it is best to use thermal imagers.
According to the Telegram channel "PPSh Laboratory", "high-quality thermal imaging equipment is capable of detecting BEC at a distance of over 3000 meters and making it possible to put the weapon on combat readiness."
“In an ideal world, the watch group detects the approach of an enemy object using thermal imaging binoculars, and, already knowing the azimuth, the shooter hits the target through a thermal imaging sight. But the problem is that one binocular and one sight per ship will not be enough,” the authors note.
A timely response to threats is necessary: increase the number of machine guns on board to combat MBEC, put on board the required number of thermal imagers (not hunting), UAV operators and even FPV drones - to the horror of the valiant naval command. Everything is not certified and not accepted for service, and a non-standard machine gun on self-tapping screws/bolts can generally shock respected people, the “Two Majors” Telegram channel reports.
"There is no need to pull the ships anywhere"
The good news is that there are solutions. The problem of maritime drones can be dealt with through the proper organization of air patrols in the Black Sea. [Yes, but in mid-January, about 3 wks prior to the latest attack on Russian war ships, 2 Russian patrol planes were shot down over the Black Sea. A holistic approach to war reporting is needed since the combined West is planning and executing operations that cut across branches of the military. The shootdown of those spy planes was a red flag warning of the impending danger to the Black Sea fleet. No special actions were taken to prevent this]. And if this condition is met, the fleet does not need to retreat anywhere and hide at its bases. A military expert, captain of the 3rd rank in the reserve, Maxim Klimov, spoke about this.
There is no need to pull the ships anywhere. We must fight! Fight, and not to pretend to fight. Normal patrolling over the Black Sea completely removes the threat of unmanned boats. With modern means of detection and destruction, and with normally organized air patrols, unmanned boats have no chance of success at all, he noted. [This is true, but in the attack on the warship, a helicopter deployed to protect it, was also destroyed by aerial drones. It was a combination attack, and that possibility must be accounted for.]
According to him, the ongoing cases of destruction of our ships no longer raise questions for the command of the Black Sea Fleet (on February 15, the resignation of the fleet commander, Admiral Viktor Sokolov, was reported), but for the command of the Navy as such [And also to top command of the armed services, since the air force and navy are both involved].
Klimov called on the country's leadership to pay attention to the fact that our Northern Fleet does not fire torpedoes under the ice. According to him, we have a catastrophic situation with anti-torpedo and mine protection equipment. In other words, the deplorable state in which the Black Sea Fleet now finds itself may suddenly appear in other fleets.
In addition, there are a number of tasks that are simply impossible to perform with small-sized maritime drones. What, for example, can replace a large landing ship? What about an aircraft carrier? If the fleet contains ships of these classes, it will inevitably have to create frigates, destroyers, and many other ships.
Unmanned boats are a very primitive product and vulnerable to gun fire. What makes it a deadly Wunderwaffe is solely the neglected state of our fleet and the inertia of the big bosses, faced with threats that they did not learn to counteract at the academy fifty years ago.
This means that the time has come for the Russian fleet to change. Otherwise, eight group attacks on each ship, paid for by the British, leave us no chance of keeping serious warships in the Black Sea.
**
Here’s your air strike update for Mar 7, 2024
Translation with my notes in bold and in [brackets]
Excerpt
7 Mar, 2-24
Retaliatory strike for the Black Sea Fleet: missile defeat in Odessa of special forces after the ceremony with Zelensky
Yesterday, March 6, a series of explosions occurred in Odessa caused by a missile strike. According to Ukrainian and Greek sources, the attack was carried out using the Iskander complex. Information about the casualties has not yet been officially confirmed, but according to some reports there are killed and wounded.
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky was at the scene of the incident while he was visiting the city. Video recordings confirm his presence at the time of the explosions. It should be noted that not all details of this episode have been officially confirmed, and the investigation is ongoing.
On March 6, 2024, a precision missile strike was carried out on a hangar in the industrial port area of Odessa. The target of the attack was unmanned boats preparing for combat use by the Ukrainian armed forces. The strike was successful and the target was destroyed.
Photo link: https://t.me/XU_kraine/51299?single
**
Translation with my notes in bold and in [brackets]
Excerpt
UKRAINE-RUSSIA STRIKES ON MARCH 7: WHAT KAMIKAZE DRONES TARGETED, WHERE THE EXPLOSIONS OCCURRED
Strikes by the Russian army with missiles, as well as drones, are carried out along the entire length of the line of contact, as well as far in depth at the rear military facilities of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Ukraine denied reports of an attempt to launch a missile strike on Zelensky’s motorcade in Odessa. We talk about the situation in the special operation zone Ukraine and beyond.
At night, Russian troops carried out drone strikes on the territory of a training ground in the Kharkov oblast, the State Emergency Service reported.
As a result of the strikes, a one-story administrative building of the training ground of one of the educational institutions of the State Emergency Service system was partially destroyed. Structural elements of the ceiling and roof of the structure also caught fire. No one was ijured.
Explosions are also reported in Zaporozhye, Slavyansk - under the control of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, and Krivoy Rog.
**
Washington has approved more than 100 separate military sales to Israel since its invasion of Gaza, even as officials complain Israeli leaders have not done enough to protect civilians
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/03/06/us-weapons-israel-gaza/
British broadcaster and writer, Mehdi Hassan, told CNN:
Biden has the power to pick up the phone and end this war, and he can call Netanyahu and tell him, "We're cutting off contact with you." Not yet 10,000 dead, 20,000 dead, today we cross 30,000 dead. You have to ask the question, why
https://www.instagram.com/abokhaledabara/reel/C4EBBXetvp6/
…
https://us11.campaign-archive.com/?e=ebbe9c8233&u=70b9fc567465118fa0b7b6e67&id=d4314b349e
Israel rejects 14-truck convoy of food aid, as Gazans starve – Day 151
Food aid convoy turned away after trend through February shows 75% rejection for northern Gaza aid; UNRWA reports on extensive abuse of Palestinian prisoners; another Gazan journalist killed; reports on ceasefire progress; Gallup poll shows Israel's popularity is waning; West Bank deaths, arrests; New York Times piece on Hamas rape debunked again; Girl Scout troop harassed for supporting Gazan children; more here
…
https://www.diwaninc.com/palestine-digest/
Israel’s War Against Palestine, Day 152: Prospect of breakthrough in ceasefire talks remains thin.
Canada will resume funding to UNRWA and pay a pledge of $25m due in April. In Gaza, another Palestinian child dies of thirst and hunger in the north, bringing the number of children to die from malnutrition to 18.
Casualties
30,717+ killed* and at least 72,156 wounded in the Gaza Strip.
423+ Palestinians killed in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.**
Israel revises its estimated October 7 death toll down from 1,400 to 1,147.
586 Israeli soldiers killed since October 7, and at least 3,221 injured.***
*Gaza’s Ministry of Health confirmed this figure on Telegram channel. Some rights groups put the death toll number closer to 35,000 when accounting for those presumed dead.
** The death toll in West Bank and Jerusalem is not updated regularly. According to PA’s Ministry of Health on March 6, this is the latest figure.
*** This figure is released by the Israeli military, showing the soldiers whose names “were allowed to be published.”
Key Developments
Israeli forces block entry of 14 trucks carrying aid and food to north Gaza, prompting World Food Program to airdrop aid with help of Jordanian Air Force.
British MP reveals that Israel denied entry of 1,350 water filters to Gaza, considered “a threat.”
A 15-year-old Palestinian girl dies of malnutrition in Al-Shifa Hospital on Wednesday, bringing total umber of children to have died from thirst and hunger in north Gaza to 18.
UNRWA distributes flour to over 370 thousand families in southern Gaza, including Khan Younis and Rafah.
UNRWA says there are 17,000 orphaned children in Gaza, with one in six children under two extremely malnourished.
Canada will resume funding to UNRWA and pledge $25m due in April.
Dr. Richard Peeperkorn of WHO says, “6,000 people [in Gaza] needed to be referred for war-related injuries and ailments, including trauma injuries, burns and amputations.”
Hamas source says American and Egyptian officials overstated optimism about possible deal to “embarrass the resistance,” exert pressure on Hamas, or blame it for collapse of talks.
Joe Biden says, “If we get into circumstances where this continues to Ramadan, Israel and Jerusalem could be very, very dangerous.”
**
https://newsletters.mondoweiss.net/emails/webview/59730/115162339768010739
IN REMEMBRANCE OF GONZALO LIRA – SEEK TRUTH FROM FACTS FOUNDATION
https://seektruthfromfacts.org/kwan/in-remembrance-of-gonzalo-lira/
My coming-to-Jesus journey on global warming, spurned by an email from Henrik Wahren, then his follow-on reply.
**
https://newsletters.mondoweiss.net/emails/webview/59730/115162339768010739
‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 153: Over 2 dozen Palestinian captives have ‘died’ in Israeli detention camps
Leila Warah
‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 153: Over 2 dozen Palestinian captives have ‘died’ in Israeli detention camps
At least 20 Palestinians have died as a result of malnutrition and dehydration in Gaza, health officials say. Meanwhile, new reports from Israeli media say 27 Palestinian captives who were being held in Israeli "makeshift cages" have died.
Read more here
Gaza’s Miracle of the Manna: Aid and the American God complex
Rebecca Lee Sanchez
Gaza’s Miracle of the Manna: Aid and the American God complex
Gaza's skies now oscillate between punishment and mercy, terror and relief, as U.S. aid is dropped among its besieged population alongside U.S.-made bombs.
**
There goes the neighborhood. US and Israel see their support dropping like a stone in the Muslim world.
Translation from Arabic with my notes in bold and in [brackets]
Link to Khanadeq report
Friday, December 15, 2023
Imam Khamenei is ahead of Bin Salman and Bin Zayed among the Arabs
In conjunction with the expansion of solidarity with the Palestinian cause in the wake of the Al-Aqsa flood battle, the percentage of support for the interim entity [Resistance writers in the Muslim world often use this term instead of the word “Israel”] and the United States of America is declining, even among the countries and peoples that support them, as a result of the occupying entity’s [another term for “Israel”] continuing crimes against civilians, and the unconditional support from America. Meanwhile, the leadership in Iran, which strongly opposes the interim entity, three weeks after the attacks, is witnessing an amazing rise in its favorability numbers, as Imam Sayyid Ali Khamenei received approval ratings among the Arabs that exceeded those of the Saudi Crown Prince, Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and the Emirati President, Mohammed bin Zayed. This is according to a study conducted by the Arab Barometer research company for the Foreign Affairs newspaper and published in a report entitled “How does the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza change Arab views?” [Leave it to the Neocon rag “Foreign Affairs” to misrepresent the war. It is a war between Israel-US and the Palestinian people!]
The article, which was translated by the Trenches website, indicates a decrease in the preferential ratings for each country that has positive or warm relations with the interim entity. It added that in truth, the Palestinian issue is still of vital importance to the Arab world. This issue has not lost its position in the new generation, despite what may have happened. As assumed by many Western capitals (and some Arab capitals), Israel will not be able to make peace with its neighbors as long as the Palestinians do not have a state.
Translated text of the article:
In the weeks before the Hamas attack on October 7 and the three weeks that followed, our nonpartisan research firm, Arab Barometer, conducted a nationally representative survey in Tunisia. About half of the 2,406 interviews were completed in the three weeks before October 7, and The remaining half in the next three weeks. As a result, a comparison of the results can show - with extraordinary precision - how the attack and subsequent Israeli military campaign changed views among Arabs.
Amazing results
US President Joe Biden recently warned that Israel was losing global support in the wake of its war on Gaza. Since October 7, every country in the survey that has positive relations with Israel has seen a decline in favorability ratings among Tunisians. The United States witnessed the largest decline, and Washington's allies in the Middle East who have established relations with Israel over the past few years also saw a decline in numbers indicating their support for American policy. [Trump’s much-touted Abrams accords will be a much harder sell now. Even those regimes that bought into it will now have to reconsider because their own people will not buy into the US-Israel genocidel]
Meanwhile, countries that remained neutral saw a slight shift. Iran's leadership, which strongly opposes Israel, saw its favorability numbers rise three weeks after the attacks, and Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei received approval ratings that matched or even exceeded those of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Emirati President Mohammed bin Zayed.
These shifts were dramatic, and changes of this magnitude rarely occur over a few weeks. But this does not indicate quick reactions on the part of Tunisians. If the Tunisian people had changed their views simply because they supported Hamas' behavior, a major shift would have occurred on the day of the attack, and then Tunisians' views would have stabilized quickly. Instead, their opinions moved little by little over three weeks, but dramatically over the entire period.
As a result, Tunisians' opinions likely shifted not in response to the Hamas attack, but to the overall subsequent events, namely the killing of civilians during the Israeli military operation in Gaza. However, the war certainly increased Tunisians' support for the Palestinian fight. Compared to polls conducted Before the October 7 attack, Tunisians today want the Palestinians to resolve the conflict with Israel by force rather than a peaceful settlement.
What is the fate of the Abraham Accords?
Public opinion matters even in non-democratic regimes, where leaders must worry about protests, and these changing opinions will reshape politics in the Arab world – as well as around the world. The United States and its regional allies will face great difficulty in expanding the Abraham Accords, which have shaped relations between many Arab countries and Israel. [This will take the Trump camp by surprise if he gets re-elected]
Washington may also lose its advantage in its competition with a rising China and Russia. The United States may even find that many of its old allies, such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, become less supportive of the United States and more accepting of its competitors.
Since the attack (October 7), the two countries (Saudi Arabia and the UAE) have welcomed Russian President Vladimir Putin on his first visit to the region since the invasion of Ukraine.
There were many transformations. However, the biggest one concerns perceptions of the United States.
In 1,146 interviews conducted before the October 7 attack, 40 percent of Tunisians had a somewhat favorable view of the United States, compared to 56 percent who had an unfavorable opinion of it. But after the war began in Gaza, that quickly changed. By the end of our fieldwork, only ten percent of Tunisians had a positive view of the United States. By contrast, 87 percent had an unfavorable impression. Before October 7, 56 percent of Tunisians wanted closer economic ties with the United States. After three weeks, that number dropped to 34 percent. Biden has never been particularly popular in Tunisia, where his approval rating stood at 29 percent before October 7. But after Israel began its campaign — and Biden declared there were “no conditions” on American support — his favorability rating dropped to six points.
The population's attitude toward a number of regional powers changed after October 7. Just like the shifts in opinion toward Washington, the changes largely track how these countries deal with Israel. For example, Saudi Arabia. Before the attack, there were high expectations that it would normalize relations with Israel. As anger toward Israel increased among Tunisians in the weeks following October 7, their views toward Saudi Arabia worsened, and Tunisians’ support for Saudi Arabia fell from 73 percent to 59 percent. Likewise, the percentage of Tunisians who wanted closer economic relations with Saudi Arabia decreased from 71 percent to 61 percent. Support for Mohammed bin Salman also dropped from 55 percent before the attack to 40 percent by October 27.
These changes are particularly notable given that Tunisian President Kais Saied, who enjoys high approval ratings at home, has very close links with Mohammed bin Salman.
The questionnaire did not include direct inquiries about the United Arab Emirates, which normalized relations with Israel in August 2020. However, respondents were asked about the UAE’s foreign policies, and the results showed that while 49 percent of Tunisians viewed the UAE’s policies positively. But by the end of the field work, this number had fallen to a third.
The truth is that the Palestinian issue is still of vital importance in the Arab world. This issue has not lost its status among a new generation despite what many Western capitals (and some Arab capitals) assume, and Israel will not be able to make peace with its neighbors as long as the Palestinians do not have a nation. In just 20 days, Tunisians' views of the world have changed in a way that rarely happens even over the course of a few years. There is no other issue across the Arab world to which people feel as individual and emotional a connection as the Palestinian issue.
Source: Foreign Affairs
Writer: Editorial room
**
Our sincerest thanks to JS for this:
RE: We Americans are taught to think this way. If you don’t understand something foreign, then it’s stupid, right? We’re the smart ones, the intellectual leaders of the planet.
SEE:
The Hubris of American Exceptionalism Devalues the Rest of the World
US exceptionalism is a hubris that reeks of bigotry and is harmful to life in other nations, David Swanson argues in this excerpt from his book.
By David Swanson , TRUTHOUT, May 10, 2018
https://truthout.org/articles/the-hubris-of-american-exceptionalism-devalues-the-rest-of-the-world/
EXCERPT:
In an exceptionalist worldview it is of absolutely zero interest that many countries have figured out big advances in healthcare coverage or gun control or fast trains or green energy or drug treatment. Why would anyone in the United States care to hear such news!
A study of presidents’ state of the union speeches between 1934 and 2008 found 2,500 mentions of other countries, but only 3 suggestions that the United States might learn anything from any of them.
As the Greatest Nation on Earth it is the rightful US role to continue bumbling along with its always greatest policies, even if those policies kill us — but especially if they merely kill other people.
**
And our thanks for this second grand-slam item from JS:
No tech for apartheid!' Google Cloud software engineer yells in support of Palestine
During the Israeli tech industry conference, MindTheTech, in New York, a Google Cloud software engineer interrupted Google "Israel" CEO Barak Regev, condemning "Israel's" aggression on #Gaza and saying, “I'm a Google Cloud software engineer and I refuse to build technology that powers genocide, apartheid or surveillance. Project Nimbus endangers Palestinians. I reject building tools for cloud apartheid. No tech for apartheid! Free Palestine!"
[Video: 31 s] Posted on 5 March 2024
BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
Project Nimbus comprises four phases, involving cloud infrastructure acquisition and construction, government policy formulation for migrating to the cloud, integration and migration processes, and cloud activity control and optimization. The third phase entails engaging numerous local suppliers to assist in the migration of government systems to the cloud and the development of systems in the cloud environment. According to experts, this technology enables increased surveillance and illegal data collection on Palestinians, facilitating the expansion of "Israel’s" unlawful settlements on Palestinian territories
"What we know about Project Nimbus is that Google and Amazon are providing cloud services and powerful technology to fuel Israeli apartheid violence, to profit off of Israeli apartheid violence, and to aid the Israeli government in scaling out systemic abuses of Palestinian human rights."
-- Ariel Koren, 2 Sep 2022 https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/palestine-google-project-nimbus-employee-accuses-profiteering-pain
"Don't be evil"
-- Google's former motto
Thanks for sharing Seek Truth From Facts, Don!