The Real and the Fake – Part 2

• Russia continues advance south of Izium,  
• Mariupol nearly taken by Russian & Donetsk forces,  
• Mariupol civilians greet Donetsk soldiers as liberators—see for yourself!   
• Ukrainian ISIS strikes again,  
• WARNING:  Cut throats, pools of blood, democracy in action! 
• War crimes?  Case closed!  Now follow the cat!
• Continued Ruble strength perplexes the Brandonites,
• De-dollarization abroad = inflation at home

To longtime readers on my mailing list—if you haven’t added me to your trusted contacts, you need to do it, please, now.  My emails are getting blocked as spam with way, way too many longtime readers, people I have heard from in the past.  Please add me to your trusted email contacts list, right now.  Thanks very much!     

To all who have left nice comments or sent messages of support, thank you!  Sadly, I no longer have time to respond to all individually.   

*****WARNING:  THERE IS AN EXTREMELY DISTURBING VIDEO INVOLVING VIOLENCE, BRUTALITY, AND DISGUSTING AND FATAL INJURIES TOWARDS THE LATTER PART OF THE BULLETIN.  YOU WILL BE WARNED AGAIN; IT IS “SAFE” TO READ UNTIL THE WARNING.  AFTER THAT, DO WHATEVER YOU CAN HANDLE.  IF YOU CAN’T HANDLE IT, PLEASE DON’T WATCH IT!  WATCH AT YOUR OWN RISK.*****

Russian advance updates

Early this week, Russia’s 252^nd Motor Rifle Regiment, 3^rd Vislenskaya Motor Rifle Division, 20^th Combined Arms Army occupied Brazhkova, halfway between Izium and Barvenkovo.  The Russian “beachhead” south of Izium continues to expand, and although Izium and other points continue to be subject to Ukrainian artillery fire of increasingly poor accuracy (leading to civilian casualties), the Ukrainian situation in the region is increasingly looking hopeless, especially as the main Russian force has not yet been activated. 

In the first confirmed Russian use of a Ukrainian railhead in support of combat operations, and in a sign that the area is considered to be safe enough, Russian “tank trains” are now being offloaded at Kupiansk, Kharkov Province, roughly 20 miles across the border from Russia, and 35-40 miles northeast of Izium. 

Using satellite surveillance, Uncle Sam is providing the Ukraine with 100 percent total intelligence on all Russian force movements, and is also likely informing Kiev as to the trajectory and timing of Russian satellite pass-overs.  It won’t help much. 

There is credible news that Russia has at least partially occupied Ugledar, a strategically important (in this war, anyway) town on the road to Mar’inka west of Donetsk, and a critical point on the approach to the major Ukrainian base at Kurakhovo. 

Following heavy bombardment, the Ukraine’s heavily-fortified “Checkpoint 29” near Lisichansk (Lugansk Province a.k.a. Lugansk Peoples’ Republic) has fallen to Lugansk forces. 

Part of this position is shown in the below video.  At around 1:00 to 1:05, you can see a steel “pillbox” type emplacement, which looks like it came straight out of World War One. 

Surrenders continue in Mariupol

The below video shows a “prearranged” (reportedly by Russian or Donetsk intelligence operatives) surrender of Ukrainian marines in or near Mariupol.  The marines drove—possibly in multiple groups, it’s not clear from the video—to a nighttime rendezvous with Donetsk forces in order to surrender, after which they were inspected for weapons and then bussed off for further disposition in captivity. 

At this time, it is likely that almost the sole remaining resistance in Mariupol is the Azov force. 

What you won’t hear about Mariupol

The below video is of a native Armenian gentleman who has lived in Mariupol for some years.  He describes how on March 7^th, with no working utilities, he had a cooking fire going outside his apartment block, when his building came under direct fire from a Ukrainian army position just down the street; he thinks they were aiming for the smoke from his cooking fire.  (Of course, that’s his perception—we don’t know.) 

His son ran outside and told him that wife/mom had just been killed, then the assault continued, he tried to cover his son, he was shot in the leg, and also wounded somehow in the abdomen.  It seems he became confused or lost consciousness, and was then taken to hospital, operated on (he shows his scars and bandages), and lost track of his son and two other kids, whom he hasn’t seen since; he doesn’t know if they are alive or dead. 

When he was in hospital, most of the staff including all surgeons abandoned their posts, leaving the patients with just a handful of generalists to run a surgical ward (of course, they couldn’t do much.) 

Then, Ukrainian forces arrived, and set up a machinegun position right in his ward.  He says the patients begged the soldiers to leave, as “there are people here”, but were told, “You’re not people to us, you’re just swine to us.” 

(This may seem strange to mainstream media consumers, but if you’ve been reading me since February, you know Mariupol rebelled in 2014 and was then basically under military occupation until Russia showed up; there was little connection and no love between the army—and even less so, the Azov—and the locals.)

He further recounts that when Russian or Donetsk forces showed up, it was a “second chance at life.”  They brought him to a safer, quieter (i.e. no nearby combat) location, where he could finally get some sleep after almost a month, and be given medicine and other aid. 

Another man near the very end of the video, says Ukrainian forces set up a mortar on the roof of the hospital. 

I’m sorry I don’t have time to subtitle this video, but you can see these grown men (including the one at the end) crying, and you know it’s all true about the hospital. 

I’ve seen many, many other videos in which civilians relate that they were deliberately shot at (and some lost relatives or saw their neighbors killed) by Ukrainian forces in Mariupol.  However, these accounts may be perception-based and not always reliable, and moreover, Russia and Donetsk as the advancing (and victorious) sides with greater access to the Internet, don’t post anything negative about what they might have done themselves. 

This explains why I have not posted any accounts from Mariupol civilians until now. 

However, the above video deserved an airing. 

I hope the man finds his kids, alive. 

You will never, ever see this in the MSM

The MSM will never show you anything like this; see the video below. 

In roughly the first half of the video, a young lady is thrilled, simply giddy to be speaking with a Donetsk reconnaissance scout.  In the second half, two adult women and three children are also elated to talk to his comrades. 

The lady with the dog, says to her dog, “Say (to the soldiers), we waited for you.”  The dark-clothed lady next to her says, “You came!”  At the very end, an off-camera male voice tells the smiling children, “Tell them ‘thank you’ that they’re pulling us out of this hell.” 

Of course, you don’t need to know Russian, or even to read my translations—just watch the faces, you’ll understand everything.  For the civilians in this video, the Donetsk soldiers are LIBERATORS.

I challenge my haters to come back at me with any comment at all, having seen this video.  They won’t have anything to say. 

I also challenge the Congressional staff reading this, to watch the video a second time and a third time, and then look yourself in the mirror and have some doubt, just have a little doubt about your talking points and all the crap you’re putting out. 

But hey, who cares, right?  We don’t hear about Mariupol in the MSM anymore.  Everyone knows the remaining Ukrainian forces there are toast, and we’re on to the Bucha Butchery—that’s the shiny object now.  Mariupol’s not sexy anymore. 

Although Mariupol today is BY FAR, FAR, FAR the single greatest tragedy of the war, as of now, Human Rights Watch (HRW) hasn’t made one press release about the city in three weeks!!! 

After the mayor abandoned his “flock” and fled to Kiev, and then Ukrainian forces and their propagandists in the city lost most of their bandwidth and access to the information space, somehow, HRW lost interest. 

As you can imagine, there’s no fundraising to be had in carrying news of Ukrainian crimes, or even simply a more balanced, realistic picture.

Yes, even the human rights watchers have to eat and “keep the lights on”, somehow.  They’re not saints.

ISIS strikes back

The bearded fighters of the (this is sarcasm) Ikrainian State of Ivano-Frankovsk and South Galicia (“ISIS”) put out another video of their handiwork. 

Their handiwork being, in this case, how they ambushed four Russian soldiers going down the road in an armored fighting vehicle that was evacuating Bucha (of all places), walked them into the middle of the road, slit all their throats, and waited for them to die.  (They shot one who didn’t die fast enough.) 

This ISIS crew reportedly includes at least one foreign fighter from Georgia (the country, not the state.)  The Georgian government has labeled all Georgian volunteers in the Ukraine as criminals, and made clear it’s not welcoming them back. 

*****WARNING:*****  THE BELOW VIDEO IS ***ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTING***; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.  ALTHOUGH IT DOESN’T SHOW THE THROATS BEING SLIT, IT’S CLEAR WHAT HAPPENED, THERE’S AN ENORMOUS AMOUNT OF BLOOD, AND YOU CAN SEE THE THROAT WOUND ON ONE SOLDIER, WHO ALSO HAS HIS HANDS BOUND.  AND THEN, THE ONE WHO ISN’T DYING FAST ENOUGH, GETS SHOT. 

AGAIN, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.  DO NOT WATCH THIS VIDEO IF YOU ARE UNDER 18 YEARS OF AGE, EASILY UPSET, OBSESSIVE, DEPRESSIVE, MENTALLY UNSTABLE, OR IF YOU HAVE ANXIETY ISSUES.  EVEN IF YOU ARE PREFECTLY WELL-ADJUSTED, ***THIS VIDEO MAY STAY WITH YOU FOR A LONG TIME.***  IF YOU WATCH IT, YOU ARE DOING SO AT YOUR OWN RISK.  DO NOT SEND ME YOUR THERAPIST’S BILL. 

Seeing as they recorded this and posted it on the Internet, how concerned do you think these “ISIS” fighters are about getting prosecuted in the Ukraine, or of making the Ukraine look bad on the world stage?   If you answered “not at all”, you are correct.  No one has time for this. 

There are Good Guys and Bad Guys, and it doesn’t matter what the Good Guys post online—no one will call them out too harshly, or say “this is a pattern.”  They can do anything, it doesn’t matter. 

Regarding the below video:  The commander of all Georgian volunteers tells an interviewer that he doesn’t take Russian prisoners—he will kill anyone who surrenders, doesn’t matter, no exceptions.  That’s his response to being asked, how can it be OK to kill men whose hands have been bound. 

(This interview between a Ukrainian and a Georgian is, of course, in perfect, unaccented Russian.  Most readers naturally won’t understand it, but it’s just for documentation, I invent nothing.)  See below: 

This is all out in the open, but most Western media don’t have the time, they’ve got a Narrative to carry. 

The New York Times and New York Post did mention the video, but they both called the slit throat on the bound soldier, with blood obviously flowing down from the mandibular joint area, a “head wound” (or something to that effect) and didn’t mention that there were all of four Russian soldiers, and that it appears all four had been executed, all with bleeding from their throats or heads at a minimum. Also, the Times (which has a very advanced, versatile website) declined to show even a blurred-out version of the video.

Fortunately, Western media do have time for this cat, see below. 

There are at least four “journalists” (and some others of unclear profession) taking a photo of this cat on a road in Bucha, the Ukraine. 

Clearly, they ran out of war crimes to investigate. 

Just the fact that they’re pursuing this cat, instead of “pounding the pavement”, tracking people down and taking extensive video testimony from local witnesses of the alleged war crimes (assuming their Ukrainian chaperones would allow that), tells you all you need to know. 

They’ve photographed a few bodies and moved on to the cat, and that’s that!    

As for me, I don’t have time for war crimes accusations from the side that employs “ISIS” and sends a squad of fully armed and armored soldiers riding around in an ambulance.  (See the below video.) 

I’m not even defending Israel, but this is Hamas-level stuff.  How much credibility do these people have? 

Anyone getting caught up in the “Bucha Butchery” narrative is a vegetable. 

The Ruble situation

As you can see above, the ruble again reached a point at which it’s more valuable than before Russia invaded the Ukraine. 

Psaki the Bullsh*t Queen told the world a few days ago that Russia paying its foreign debt in rubles (because its euro and dollar assets are frozen) would constitute a default, which, you know, is really, really, bad.  

In fact, as soon as news got out that Russia made its first rubles-in-lieu-of-dollars payment, the ruble strengthened notably.    

Brandon’s people are dumb.  Trump’s crew would have understood what’s going on.  It’s not about “confidence” or any of that psycho-mumbo-jumbo—it’s about supply and demand.  The more a currency is used, the higher the demand for it, and that will put a floor under its price.  

Of course, demand won’t be high if you’re a bit player like Syria or North Korea.  But it can work out great if you’re a big player and you’re entwined with global finance and people really, really need what you’re selling.  

Russians are now talking about the ruble potentially rising to 60 to the dollar, which figure I suggested in a recent post.  However, this would actually be bad for Russia.  They need the ruble in the 80 to 90 range. 

De-dollarization means inflation

Between sharply falling imports into Russia, inability of foreign entities (or their subsidiaries) with Russian operations or investments to sell Russian assets or to repatriate Russian revenue or dividends, inability of rich Russians to get their money out, and severely reduced travel by Russians abroad, per Russian analysts the local demand for dollars and euros has been reduced by at least (in dollar terms) $250 billion annualized.  

A potentially equal effect is in the works with the de-dollarization of trade between China/India and Russia (which has already happened or is now happening with respect to oil and other commodities), and as regards Saudi Arabian oil sales to China as well as other commodities exporters and China.    

That is, I assume there’s more we’re not seeing.  China has observed what happened to Russia, sees that “it’s next”, and is likely moving to pay its African friends in its own currency for their exports.  Might as well get them used to it now, before the hammer comes down! 

When demand for dollars is reduced overseas, the sequestration effect whereby our credit expansion (in terms of deficit spending and low rates) does not lead to domestic price inflation as the money finds itself “locked up” overseas, is thrown into reverse.  

It’s not just about the raw sums I’ve mentioned above, it’s also that the 50-year-old sequestration process simply doesn’t—and won’t—work anymore, and the trend is in the wrong direction for the U.S. and Europe.   

This is hugely inflationary, and if I see it, the U.S. Federal Reserve also sees it, and thus, part of the reason they’re panicking and they want to raise rates sharply (which will kill off everything), is the war in the Ukraine, and how the U.S. and Europe have responded to it.

Yes, you read me correctly.  Our mortgage rates, car loan rates, etc. will go up—and bring down the roof, until or unless the Fed walks it back—in part because of how “they” froze Russia’s dollar and euro assets, and tried to lock it out of global finance. 

And if the Fed walks it back, we’ll have much more price inflation, and over a longer period—years and years. 

There is no way out.