…so

The decision, first reported on Sunday, to allow Ukraine to conduct strikes with US-made weapons deep into sovereign Russian territory has not been formally announced by the White House, but a German government spokesperson said on Monday that Berlin had been informed.

“It is clear that the outgoing administration in Washington intends to take steps to continue to add fuel to the fire and to further inflame tensions around this conflict,” Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters. “This decision is reckless, dangerous, aimed at a qualitative change, a qualitative increase in the level of involvement of the United States.”

Russia’s foreign ministry said in a statement that the use of long-range US-supplied missiles against its territory would “represent the direct involvement of the United States and its satellites in hostilities against Russia.” It added: “Russia’s response in such a case will be appropriate and palpable.”

…just for a second…let me lay that out the way I heard one of these assholes lay out their line on it…if ukraine is really part of russia anyway the way they frame it…then it’s not russia (& pals) vs ukraine (with help)…nah…it’s russia vs the rest of the world…which…must be weird if you’re some north korean headed to a front line in a faraway foreign land

…& they say the new thing only works if you have US munitions being targeted using mapping only available to the states with destinations inside the soveriegn territory of russia…so *that’s* the unforgivably irresponsible bit of escalatory insanity

…yeah

…it’s…a russian thing…several innocent cherry orchards were sacrificed to make this statement…or would have been if they had any left…but they say a lot of shit so I’m guessing they made the transition to firewood a long time ago…I haven’t found a text version but I heard one of them on the radio & when the BBC lady asked how that was supposed to add up given that another way to put it would be missiles fired from within russia attack ukraine’s sovereign territory & it’s a basic principle that on the one hand they get to defend themselves against that…& the logical way to do that is to take out the firing point…the response boiled down to…if they do this thing then don’t be susprised if there isn’t a happy christmas because putin already nuked some places…maybe in poland or germany…or both

There were further Russian threats issued in state media, with the prominent propagandist Dmitry Kiselyov saying the west was directly entering the war “with all the ensuing consequences for their own territories and those inhabiting them”. Kiselyov said: “The response could be anything. Anything.”

…&…again with the part where it’s par for a particular russian course…& not necessarily a rhetorical escalation given he’s been saying “I might hit the button if you do” just about anytime anyone provides ukraine with anything that puts him at a lesser advantage…but the line included a whole tack about how the west were the aggressors in this whole thing…that only works if you buy the busted premise that crushing a nation with overwhelming military force is the sort of thing the world ought to be prepared to overlook…&…well…three-way-spidey-pointing-at-spidey.gif on the hypocrisy on show at the moment…but

“Any option involving the freezing [of the conflict] along the line of engagement is unacceptable for Russia in any case,” Peskov said, adding that Putin had declared Russia’s demands for ending the war in June when he said Ukraine would have to drop its Nato ambitions and withdraw all its troops from all the territory of four regions claimed by Russia.

…I dunno…around when biden got sworn in the bulletin of the atomic scientists set the doomsday clock at 90seconds to…& you’d have to guess come the end of this coming january…they probably aren’t moving that away from midnight…so…that’s…not exactly festive

A German government spokesperson said, however, that Germany was sticking with its decision not to supply Kyiv with long-range Taurus missiles. The decision by the chancellor, Olaf Scholz, to withhold its most powerful missile has been a significant point of contention in Germany.

“The chancellor’s decision is unchanged,” the German government spokesperson told a regular news conference in Berlin. Last week, Scholz held a telephone conversation with Putin about the war in Ukraine, in a move that drew criticism from Kyiv.

…I mean

“The pro-war mainstream has launched its last, desperate attack on the new reality”,” the Hungarian foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, wrote on Facebook, referring to the recent victory of Donald Trump.

“The hawkish politicians ousted from power refuse to take note of the will of the people. This is not only undemocratic, but also extremely dangerous,” Szijjártó added.

…how many assholes who voted for the asshole even remember why the name maria butina is familiar?

Some Russian officials openly voiced hopes that the incoming Trump administration would overturn the decision after taking office in late January.

“These guys, Biden’s administration, are trying to escalate the situation to the maximum while they still have power and are still in office,” the Russian lawmaker Maria Butina said. “I have a great hope that Trump will overcome this decision if this has been made because they are seriously risking the start of world war three, which is not in anybody’s interest.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/18/kremlin-accuses-biden-administration-of-wanting-to-escalate-ukraine-conflict

…so…I dunno if it means whenever it is I’m destined to wind up on the wrong side of the legit-angst:paranoid-terror line has receeded into the rear view at this point…but…the part that scared me the most in that wasn’t the nuclear sabre-rattling?

Russia has been able to bomb targets across all of Ukraine throughout the war. On Sunday it attacked key sites across the country’s power network, forcing Kyiv to implement national electricity rationing as a result of the damage caused. Some missiles were aimed as far west as Lviv and at sites near the border with Moldova, and an energy crisis is closer as a result.

…I mean…they keep bringing up the damn nukes

Kyiv did not have a significant long-range missile programme before the full-scale Russian invasion and has been hamstrung by its western backers ever since. The US, UK and France may have donated long-range missiles but they have only allowed them to be used against targets inside Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders – meaning that key airfields, fuel depots, logistics sites and barracks in Russia had remained beyond the reach of Ukraine, except through drone attacks.

…but…if the paperwork a whole bunch of places signed when ukraine *gave up a shitload of fucking nukes that they had possession of*…then we would have done more than shrugged when they annexed crimea…so the…gall…involved is…fuck…up there with pretending there’s a side to pick between the ones waging holy wars in the middle east that equates to rooting for the innocent people david’s pure-bred goliaths are bombing into the stone age…or…ultimately…that trying to pontius pilate our way into saying it’s between israel & the parts of the world that want to make it look the way it’s made the gaza strip look…would be a karmic-zero on the big board…so fuck there being no smoke without fire…we know from shit being on fire everyplace you look…smoke is a given…we all live in informational pea-soupers…& that’s before the fucking fog of war kicks in

“Reading the tea leaves, unfortunately this looks like more incrementalism,” said George Barros, a Ukraine expert at the US Institute for the Study of War. “It looks like the US wants the Atacms missiles to be used precisely against the North Koreans in Kursk, yet there is a large volume of meaningful Russian support infrastructure in locations such as Rostov, Belgorod and Vorenezh.”

Though there have been no Atacms missile attacks inside Russia recorded yet, some effects are expected to be immediate. Russian military planners are likely to move anything they believe is at risk out of range if they can do so fast enough.

That may be good value for the US also given that Atacms stockpiles are not plentiful and the missiles, at a cost of somewhere between $1m and$2m, are not cheap.

There may also be a value in directly threatening North Korea, whose entry into the war is hugely significant, Barros said. “So far the western response has been lacklustre, and there are reports that North Korea may be willing to send as many as 100,000 to fight against Ukraine.” With Russia and Ukraine’s combat forces considered very roughly matched at somewhere between 600,000 and 700,000, dissuading North Korea from sending more troops could be significant.

…could be…but…honestly…as much as it makes me feel like a fucking bond villain just to have it flit across my mind…still not the part that really did the ice-cube-down-your-collar shiver thing for me

With a Donald Trump presidency looming, Ukraine also badly needs an opportunity to show what it can do, with western help, on the battlefield. “The Ukrainians need to convince the incoming US administration that they are still worth backing – in Trump’s transactional view, a ‘good investment’,” argued Matthew Savill, of the Royal United Services Institute thinktank.

…that bit got pretty warm…but…I’ll get to it…plenty more to help work up to that part so you hopefully won’t blame me too much for presuming upon your company in my misery

In response, the west has to contend with Russian threats of escalation, though the reality of the Ukraine war is that, as Savill points out, Moscow “has already escalated”. Russia is already engaged in a heightened sabotage campaign across Europe, with assassination plots targeting western arms makers and arson plots, including sending incendiary devices via the DHL network to the UK.

Meanwhile in Ukraine, the attacks on power plants and substations primarily affect civilians, particularly when electricity is lost. “Russia’s strategy of escalating attacks, especially around holidays or weekends, is intended to break the spirit of Ukrainians and remind them of the hardships of war,” said Vladyslav Faraponov, the head of the board of Ukraine’s Institute of American Studies.

However, few experts believe that even allowing Ukraine to use Atacms more broadly inside Russia will have a decisive military effect. The US permission may well be followed by the UK, France and Italy agreeing to donate more of their Storm Shadow/Scalp missiles, which have a similar range, and allowing them to be used inside Russia. But again, stocks are limited, even if permission is given by the Europeans and the US, which provides a guidance system on which the missile relies.

Ukraine remains under serious pressure in the east, with Russian forces threatening to form a pocket that would encircle Kurakhove in the south. Though Russian casualties are running at record levels of about 1,500 a day, as the Kremlin tries to persuade Trump and his team that its victory is inevitable with constant frontline attacks, Ukraine is also short on personnel numbers and has never obtained decisive western support at any point during the war.

“Over time, Ukrainians have learned to live with initial refusals on the delivery or use of critical weapons, followed by hesitant ‘maybes’, and only after countless lives are lost, a reluctant ‘yes’. Unfortunately, this reactive approach is not what Ukraine needs to preserve its independence or endure potential negotiations,” Faraponov said.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/18/letting-ukraine-fire-missiles-into-russia-unlikely-to-have-decisive-effect

…now derp oranjeboomer likes to say his boy vladdy-p wouldn’t have invaded ukraine if he’d been on deck…but…I think if I’m honest…I probably buy that actually the part where he made his bid for crimea in ’14…right at the time he was ramping up all that handy dandy active social media measures of a cambridge analytica bent that fully achieved its ends in getting the fuckstain to an electorally collegiate error of systemically hacked democracy in the context of a destablized europe…would very much be in line with a chain of implications strongly suggestive of the fact that he most likely wouldn’t have invaded ukraine if hillary won…& if you think that was the part I was being coy about…I’m sorry to tell you that’s still on the thin end of the wedge that might also be the slippery slope

The House speaker’s pathetic case for deep-sixing the Gaetz ethics report [WaPo]

…so…exhibit #don’tgivemethenumbers

Allies of the president-elect, Donald Trump, have lashed out angrily at Joe Biden for his decision to permit Ukraine to use long-range US missiles to launch attacks inside Russia for the first time, in what the Kremlin has termed an “escalation” in the war.

Key Trump surrogates, including his son Donald Trump Jr, hardline congressional Republicans, and other backers have accused Biden of seeking to spark “world war three” before Trump’s presidential inauguration in January.

…you know what…I’m not having any fun this morning & I feel like I’m having a sort of out-of-body experience where I ruin the morning of a bunch of folks I actually like a fair bit in a way I somehow succeed in telling myself I mostly manage not to be personally guilty of so much as a vehicle for…so…let’s be honest…I only typed #don’tgivemethenumbers to paraphrase the star wars quote…so…I’m taking a leaf out of our blacksmith’s book & having a musical interlude of profoundly unserious tonality

…because…damn it…I can be fun & terrifed…it’s like walking & chewing gum at the same time

…you see…I couldn’t find a text version of a spokesman saying it with a native russian accent…but…that’s not to say you can’t find plenty of stuff quoting the exact same lines

Richard Grenell, a former acting director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term, who was seen as a potential candidate for secretary of state, wrote: “No one anticipated that Joe Biden would ESCALATE the war in Ukraine during the transition period. This is as if he is launching a whole new war. Everything has changed now – all previous calculations are null and void.”

…if the russian guy had a hand up their ass for the full ventriloquist routine it wouldn’t be any different

Other Republicans to sound off included the far-right congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and the Utah senator Mike Lee, who said: “Joe Biden has just set the stage for World War III. Let’s all pray that it doesn’t come to this.”

…full disclosure…I didn’t want it to come to this…when I sat down in front of the keyboard with my usual lack of a particular route to the bottom in mind…I definitely didn’t want it to be this one…because I feel bad about it in ways I try to err against…but time is a factor & once the snowball gains momentum I’m less indiana jones in raiders than sisyphus having a bad day trying to get back to the start line without the boulder rolling him for a change

The decision by the White House will set up a dilemma for the incoming administration on whether to immediately roll back the authorisation after Trump’s inauguration or retain it as a potential bargaining chip in the negotiations the president-elect has said he wants to hold in order to end the fighting.

While Trump and his allies have broadly denounced increasing military support and financial aid for the Ukrainian government, analysts said it was unclear whether Trump would move immediately to repeal the decision regarding long-range missiles.

“On the first day they could announce, ‘We are suspending this authorization pending a review of Ukraine policy,’” said Mark Cancian, a senior adviser with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a thinktank based in Washington. “But that would engender a lot of criticism and revive all these stories about some deals with Putin.”

He said it was not a foregone conclusion that Trump would immediately repeal the decision. “One is just the political cost isn’t worth the gain, but Trump’s also a deal-maker, and that would be to give away something without getting anything for it … to start off with a concession is just bad negotiating tactics.”

…so…here it is…what really scares me…& here’s for why…I also heard zelensky say some shit…& he leant pretty hard on the part where…to hear him tell it…donnie-donnie-how’s-he-free getting back into office means the war will end faster than it would have under kamala…because the white house will need it to…because that’s the promise the phantom of mar a lago has made to the choir he preaches to

…&…that outcome very possibly reduces down to a bottom line of the US capitulating to russia’s demands & fucking over the ukrainians…it is freaking me out that a guy with a track record of brutally pragmatic attempts to play his position in this that has frankly stunned me with its ability to leverage how domestic audiences in friendly states see things reflecting on his counterparts…played that card

Theresa Fallon, the director of the Center for Russia Europe Asia Studies in Brussels, said that there were mixed reactions among European military officials, with some worried about the potential for an escalation, while others were “happy … that Ukraine could now use the equipment without one hand tied behind their back any more. But this decision came late, very late, [Ukraine] needs to be able to defend itself, and use this equipment for what it was designed to do. But we should keep in mind it is not going to be a game changer and more equipment is needed.”

“I can’t predict what Trump will do,” she said. “But … once these things are in place, there is a momentum to continue to use them. It may be hard to put it back into the box. But on the other hand, if there is not a resupply of missiles then the use of them for targets in Russia will have run its course.”

…&…if we all make it through the other side intact…if very possibly all at sea…what’s that course going to look like it charted in retrospect?

“The Military Industrial Complex seems to want to make sure they get World War 3 going before my father has a chance to create peace and save lives,” wrote Donald Trump Jr on X, the social network formerly known as Twitter.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/nov/18/trump-biden-ukraine-missiles-russia

…because that right there?

…that’s a man so mind-bendingly fucking dumb that a court took seriously the idea that he shouldn’t be prosecuted for a little light treason on the grounds that he lacked the mens rea…because he isn’t conscious enough for a consciousness of guilt to develop any traction on the smooth surface beneath his cranium…literally putting in the hard yards for messaging the press reporting on it apparently won’t quote from the source…but is delighted to from any number of proxies…& the idea that come january vlad could actually agree to take his ball & go home…& iran & bibi might stop salting the earth long enough to break bread…& even though the deal was as bad as all his others when you get into the detail…which his cheerleaders never do…they’ll actually write it up like saner minds prevailed…&…an electoral plurality in the US will believe that to be evidence that re-electing a man who ought to have been un-electable is further proof positive of the rightful supremacy of the pre-eminence of american exceptionalism

…that’s why I want whisky for breakfast

…well…more like that’s the straw that broke the alcoholic camel’s back

Behind Trump’s victory lies a cold reality: liberals have no answers for a modern age in crisis [Guardian]

For the first time in its history, we could be looking at a genuinely rightwing European Union [Guardian]

…it’s…not just me?

‘The fatigue is not only real, it is absolutely legitimate’: why are so many of us so tired right now? [Guardian]

…but…fuck

Gangs looting Gaza aid operate in areas under Israeli control, aid groups say [WaPo]

…if anyone needs me?

The uncommitted campaign showed the Democratic party ignores Gaza at its peril [Guardian]

…stuff like that?

One of the Quran’s best-known verses — which I’ve half-jokingly referred to as “the breakup verse” — says that “you may dislike something although it is good for you, or like something although it is bad for you: God knows and you do not.” When a relationship ends, we feel like we will never be whole again. We struggle to imagine life without our beloved. But what we usually find, in time, is that we can recover. We grow and we learn. Often, with enough of hindsight’s benefits, we realize that it was better this way.

In politics as in love, uncertainty and doubt shadow every choice. In an election, competing ideas and candidates are put before us. We do our best with the information we have. We cast our vote, we organize, we participate — but then the outcome is out of our hands. At some point, we have little choice but to let go of control. One of my favorite sayings of the prophet Muhammad aptly captures this progression. The prophet asks a Bedouin man why he has left his camel to roam without tying it down. The man says, “I put my trust in God.” The prophet is unimpressed and replies, “Tie your camel first, and then put your trust in God.”

What Islam taught me about accepting defeat [WaPo]

…if it turns out I went back to bed…& took the bottle with me…that’s probably the sort of shit I’d wave my arm at while trying not to spill any of the good stuff if you asked me what the fuck was wrong with me today?

…&…they aren’t as good as the first one…but…to tide you over while my sorry ass hunts a bunch of tunes by way of a sorry-about-that-there…here’s some sequels

…&…fuck it…if this is the metaphor I’ve dug myself into…for the sake of clarity…if vader is orange under the vaguely phallic helmet…then vlad’s darth sidious is the robot chicken sort

…I dunno if they’ll help you like they helped me…but…I left the rap to the third dozen…if that helps?