Ukraine captures more Russian equipment, but civilian deaths keep growing

The movies of deserted and destroyed Russian gear could also be a humiliation to Russia’s ever-crooked leaders, however it’s new photographs of widespread civilian deaths that will get a few of these leaders indicted for battle crimes. We’re seeing corporations that had been beforehand holding out announce that they, too, might be closing their Russian ventures. This can be a results of public stress; it might even be company recognition, now, that the scenario has so devolved that the one two doubtless outcomes (a brand new battle that pits NATO international locations towards Russia, or a sanctions regime that will lower off Russia’s financial system indefinitely) each bode unwell for enterprise. Not for months, however for a decade or longer.

Putin himself seems to be making an attempt to impress a wider battle, maybe as a result of he believes new world sanctions pose a far larger threat to his private rule than a conflict with NATO international locations would. And the absurdity of every new anti-Ukraine conspiracy theory being supplied up by Russia’s prime leaders means that the person could have already got disposed of any Russian officers with even the vaguest hints of intelligence, forsaking solely whichever opportunists might most vigorously lick his boots.

The explanation Russian navy forces are operating out of fuel and limping alongside on rotted tires is changing into clearer by the day, and it is main Russia’s adversaries to ask the one query Vladimir Putin has spent his total profession protecting nations from asking: Simply how a lot of Russia’s vaunted navy is fictitious? We’ll discover out quickly how a lot of their provides and capabilities exist solely on paper after Putin and his fellow kleptocrats bled the nation dry.

A few of at this time’s Ukraine information:

Right here at house, Republican elected officers are nonetheless caught in the identical conundrum they have been in because the battle’s starting: easy methods to mouth help for Ukraine whereas nonetheless stonewalling that help and pushing numerous Trump-backed conspiracy theories towards the Ukrainian authorities Trump continues to assault.