Ukraine - Mines, Missiles, Warcrimes And A Warning To Zelenski

 

moon of alabama   

Russia continues its special military operation in Ukraine in a relatively slow manner.

Its military is tasked with the 'demilitarization' and 'denazification' of Ukraine. This task does not require large movements of the front line as the Ukrainian government continues to send fresh troops and nazis units towards the Russian lines. There the Russians reliably maul them without taking significant casualties on their own side.

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The Ukrainian government and its military continue to commit war crimes.

Since a few days the Ukraine is firing missiles with thousands of anti-personal mines into Donetsk city and other population centers in the east. These are not powerful enough to kill but are designed to maim anyone who steps on them or tries to pick them up.

biggerTheir color is green and brown so one will hardly see them when they are laying in grass or on rough ground. The Russian's once had similar mines but those deactivated themselves after 24 hours. The Ukrainian ones do not do that. They will still be dangerous months from now. Russia has send hundreds of troops to help with the demining.---

On July 29 two HIMARS missiles were fired onto a prison camp in Olenivka (also written Elenovka), some 30 kilometers south of Donetsk city. They hit the barracks that housed Azov nazi fighters who had been caught in Mariupol. Fifty of those died and some 70 were wounded in the missile attack. Ukraine denied that it had launched the missiles and accused the Russians of willfully killing the prisoners.

However Russia does not need to fire missiles or bomb barracks to kill prisoners it already holds. It can simply take them out of of their barracks and hang or shoot them. It also would not wound 70 people it now must additionally care for.

Via Politico U.S. officials are covering for the Ukraine:

American-made rocket launchers not used in Ukraine prison strike, U.S. assesses

The U.S. has assessed that Ukraine did not attack a prison in a Russian-occupied eastern region of Donetsk with American-made rocket launchers last week, directly contradicting Russian claims, according to two U.S. officials.
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However, no traces of the U.S.-provided weapons were found at the site, according to two U.S. officials with knowledge of the assessment, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic.

“We know Ukraine didn’t attack the site with HIMARS because the site doesn’t have the indications it would have if it was hit with HIMARS,” one of the officials said.

While one of the officials stopped short of saying Ukraine was not responsible for the strike, the other official said the evidence showed the attack was not conducted by Kyiv. Satellite photos of the site released by Maxar Technologies on July 30 appear to show damage only to the section of the detention center housing Ukrainian prisoners, with no collateral damage to surrounding buildings.

The warheads of the shorter range HIMARS missiles have 91 kilogram (200 pound) warheads. That is a relative little amount of explosives. HIMARS hits are precise and do not create wide ranging collateral damage. That is there whole point.

The claim that 'no traces of the U.S.-provided weapons were found at the site' is also definitely false. Several TV teams have visited the side and filmed the collected debris on the same day the incident had happened during the early morning hours. The diameter of these rocket motor parts fits to HIMARS missiles. Other filmed debris showed typical fragments of the HIMARS missile war head.

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It was the Ukraine, and especially its dubious leaders, who had an interest in killing the Azov prisoners. These had started to talk with Russian interviewers and were revealing war crimes for which the leadership in Ukraine is directly responsible.

On July 28 the Russians published a video of an interview with Azov nazi soldier Dmytro Kozatsky, call sign Orest, who directly accused Zelenski advisor Arestovich of ordering the killing of Russian soldiers who had been taken prisoners.

Kozatsky was running the public relation side for his Azov unit. Even before the war started, Kozatsky says, Arestovich was preparing an information campaign with shock videos that were supposed to show the torture and killing of Russian soldiers taken prisoners. Kozatsky received such an order and passed it on. He later noted that such shock videos were indeed made and published on social media sides.

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That witness statement is enough to put Arestovich into jail for a very long time. He responded by sending HIMARS missiles to kill the prisoners which were taking to the Russians and accusing him.

Publishing videos of the torturing and killing of Russian prisoners was supposed to deter Russian soldiers from further fighting in the war. This tactic was also used in the 1940s by the Ukrainian nazi collaborators of the OUN. It had the opposite effect of what it was supposed to do. The Russian were enraged about those films and photographs and fought even harder.

Today the Russian defense ministry accused Washington of being behind the missile attacks:

Russian Defence Ministry has recorded and is taking into account for the future an official admission by General Skibitsky, deputy head of the Chief Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine, that Washington directly coordinates each target for Kiev before strikes from US-made HIMARS MLRS.

Speaking to The Telegraph's British journalists, Skibitsky admitted that "before rocket launches, there are consultations between intelligence officials from both countries, which allow Washington to stop any potential attacks if they were unhappy with the intended target".

All this undeniably proves that Washington, contrary to White House and Pentagon claims, is directly involved in the conflict in Ukraine.

It is Biden administration that is directly responsible for all Kiev-approved rocket attacks on residential areas and civilian infrastructure in populated areas of Donbas and other regions, which have resulted in mass deaths of civilians.

No one else in Ukraine or in the world should have any doubts that the strikes by HIMARS rockets on Novaya Kakhovka on July 12, on Stakhanov on July 17, on Krasniy Luch on July 24, dozens of strikes on Donetsk and, of course, the July 29 strike on the detention facility in Elenovka, which killed 50 and injured 73 Ukrainian POWs, were planned by Zelensky regime and approved by Washington.

Political, criminal and moral responsibility for the Elenovka massacre and other war crimes in Ukraine, along with Zelensky, lies directly with Biden administration.

The relevant Telegraph piece was published yesterday:

Britain helps Ukraine hunt for Russian spies eyeing Western military aid

Asked how the US-provided Himars multiple-launch rocket systems have so precisely targeted Russian fuel and ammunition depots, as well as battlefield headquarters in eastern Ukraine, Gen Skibitsky said “in this case in particular, we use real-time information”.

US officials are not providing direct targeting information, which would potentially undermine their case for not being direct participants in the war, Gen Skibitsky said.

However, he suggested there was a level of consultation between intelligence officials of both countries prior to launching missiles that would allow Washington to stop any potential attacks if they were unhappy with the intended target.

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Someone in the Biden administration told New York Time columnist Thomas Friedman to fire a warning shot against the Ukrainian president Zelenski.

He does so today in a column that warns about Pelosi's trip to Taiwan.

Why Pelosi’s Visit to Taiwan Is Utterly Reckless

Dear reader: The Ukraine war is not over. And privately, U.S. officials are a lot more concerned about Ukraine’s leadership than they are letting on. There is deep mistrust between the White House and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky — considerably more than has been reported.

And there is funny business going on in Kyiv. On July 17, Zelensky fired his country’s prosecutor general and the leader of its domestic intelligence agency — the most significant shake-up in his government since the Russian invasion in February. It would be the equivalent of Biden firing Merrick Garland and Bill Burns on the same day. But I have still not seen any reporting that convincingly explains what that was all about. It is as if we don’t want to look too closely under the hood in Kyiv for fear of what corruption or antics we might see, when we have invested so much there. (More on the dangers of that another day.)
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In short, this Ukraine war is SO not over, SO not stable, SO not without dangerous surprises that can pop out on any given day. Yet in the middle of all of this we are going to risk a conflict with China over Taiwan, provoked by an arbitrary and frivolous visit by the speaker of the House?

It is Geopolitics 101 that you don’t court a two-front war with the other two superpowers at the same time.

As long as the U.S. keeps financing Zelenski he will continue to rule as he sees fit while also growing his already considerable nest egg.

Posted by b on August 2, 2022 at 14:53 UTC | Permalink

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2022/08/ukraine-mines-missiles-warcrimes-and-a-warning-to-zelenski.html#more