Russia/Ukraine conflict

[madodel]

European Court of Human Rights strikes down Russia's claims against Ukraine

Poor Russia, all their attempts to stand up for human rights are shot down by the ECHR including Ukraine being responsible for Russian forces actually shooting down MH17 in 2014.

 

[wdolson]

I came across this the other day
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

Translation
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

It looks at food production and consumption numbers to check the numbers on Russia's population. I guess an accepted standard of grain consumption for a country that doesn't have food scarcity is about 1 tonne per person per year. This includes grain that goes into animal feed, alcohol production, and other uses. In the US that would also include ethanol production for motor fuels, but that is probably more minimal in Russia. Though Russians drink more distilled ethanol than Americans.

In 2018 Russia produced 100 million tonnes of grain and exported 40 million, which leaves 70 million consumed domestically. The article points out that the 1 tonne per person is probably high for many countries. It is that for the US.

I looked up some other statistics mentioned in the article and found some interesting numbers. In 2018 there were about 57 million cars registered in Russia and in 2021 there were 146 million cell phones active!
Telecommunication in Russia

Even if Russia's reported population numbers are accurate, most people have at least 2 cell phones.

I was also thinking about an essay Science Fiction author Robert Heinlein wrote about his trip to the USSR in 1960. He and his wife toured Moscow and took some time one day to sit on a park bench and "compare notes". They knew being one of the few western tourists they were probably being watched so they chose an open area to discuss what they were thinking. He had been looking at the transportation logistics and had come to the conclusion that Moscow must be 1/2 the size the Soviets claimed. His wife had been looking at other factors and had come to the same conclusion.

He was left pretty convinced the Soviets were lying about the population of the USSR.

I also came across something a few weeks ago that Rosstat quit actually measuring vital statistics like births and deaths some years ago and they have been reporting made up numbers. Additionally the supposedly measured numbers may have been cooked for a while. The conclusion was that Russia's under 20 population may be much smaller than the official numbers, and the official numbers don't look good for Russia's long term economic health.

I doubt that Russia's population is actually 70 million. But less than 1/2 tonne per person per year is probably a bit low for a country that eats meat, probably doesn't make ethanol for motor fuel, but does make a lot of alcohol for human consumption.

I would guess the population of Russia might be as low as 100 million. It probably isn't the 145 million that Russia claims it is.

 

[AudubonB]

I came across this the other day
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

Translation
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

Re your desire to moonlight as a translator: Might want to consider keeping your day job

 

[bo3bdar]

Nice long video with action and soldiers explaining what happened:

That video is very impressive. Good work from the UKR press office too, to show what is happening during the 'slow' counter-offensive. Good timing, and an actually good response. This is professionally produced, it has a storyline with flashback vignettes. This is not the usual twitter video dumps. Enable the ClosedCaptioning to get English subtitles.


Lots of interesting anecdata from the video-

that trench line had 6 orcs in it. I know next to nothing here, but that doesn't seem like full strength, but also not the expected meager resources we've been expecting. That trench line had 4 firing lines, and one surveillance spot, so seems like it was fully manned? At the start the commander talks about two groups being there, not one. Which suggests perhaps two groups of three?

those guys were fully armed, not short on ammo, and even had a couple of higher caliber weapons like RPGs, grenade launchers, anti-tank weapons, and the PKP submachine gun trophy. This is front line people, but they at least were not starving to death and out of ammo. I don't know guns, but the UKR guy who got the AKMS was very excited to get that.

they didn't give up, and fought pretty hard. Only one guy surrendered, and they talked about another orc who was smart and tough to beat.

orc morale did seem bad enough that they broke and ran from the first line of defense. The second line they may have felt they had no choice but to fight.

sooo many mines. Complete luck the UKR did not fall into some.

impressive UKR results for infantry acting as stormtroopers. One injured while killing 5 orcs. The UKR troops only had 7 guys against 6 orcs and it was nearly a clean sweep.

extremely impressive UKR Operational Security- we see almost nothing of what is happening. Every person in the field has a camera on them, every commander has a GoPro, and every fight has drones overhead. And we see almost nothing leak from them.

 

[SmokyPeat]

I came across this the other day
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

Translation
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

It looks at food production and consumption numbers to check the numbers on Russia's population. I guess an accepted standard of grain consumption for a country that doesn't have food scarcity is about 1 tonne per person per year. This includes grain that goes into animal feed, alcohol production, and other uses. In the US that would also include ethanol production for motor fuels, but that is probably more minimal in Russia. Though Russians drink more distilled ethanol than Americans.

In 2018 Russia produced 100 million tonnes of grain and exported 40 million, which leaves 70 million consumed domestically. The article points out that the 1 tonne per person is probably high for many countries. It is that for the US.

I looked up some other statistics mentioned in the article and found some interesting numbers. In 2018 there were about 57 million cars registered in Russia and in 2021 there were 146 million cell phones active!
Telecommunication in Russia

Even if Russia's reported population numbers are accurate, most people have at least 2 cell phones.

I was also thinking about an essay Science Fiction author Robert Heinlein wrote about his trip to the USSR in 1960. He and his wife toured Moscow and took some time one day to sit on a park bench and "compare notes". They knew being one of the few western tourists they were probably being watched so they chose an open area to discuss what they were thinking. He had been looking at the transportation logistics and had come to the conclusion that Moscow must be 1/2 the size the Soviets claimed. His wife had been looking at other factors and had come to the same conclusion.

He was left pretty convinced the Soviets were lying about the population of the USSR.

I also came across something a few weeks ago that Rosstat quit actually measuring vital statistics like births and deaths some years ago and they have been reporting made up numbers. Additionally the supposedly measured numbers may have been cooked for a while. The conclusion was that Russia's under 20 population may be much smaller than the official numbers, and the official numbers don't look good for Russia's long term economic health.

I doubt that Russia's population is actually 70 million. But less than 1/2 tonne per person per year is probably a bit low for a country that eats meat, probably doesn't make ethanol for motor fuel, but does make a lot of alcohol for human consumption.

I would guess the population of Russia might be as low as 100 million. It probably isn't the 145 million that Russia claims it is.

I think the main issue stifling Russian fuel ethanol production for domestic consumption is that the Russians would literally consume it.

 

[Artful Dodger]

Does anyone know if there are any mechanisms to make unpermanent Permanent Membership on the Security Council? I refer, of course, to the easing out of Russia from its position.

How to expel Russia from the UN | The Hill › opinion | Nov 3, 2022

How to expel Russia from the UN

Russia is a major threat to the existence of a stable, rules-based international system.

thehill.com

 

[wdolson]

Re your desire to moonlight as a translator: Might want to consider keeping your day job

It's just Google Translate.

I think the main issue stifling Russian fuel ethanol production for domestic consumption is that the Russians would literally consume it.

They also have a lot of oil and little incentive to protect the environment burning cleaner fuels. But humans drinking the fuel would probably be a problem there too.

 

[petit_bateau]

I came across this the other day
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

Translation
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

It looks at food production and consumption numbers to check the numbers on Russia's population. I guess an accepted standard of grain consumption for a country that doesn't have food scarcity is about 1 tonne per person per year. This includes grain that goes into animal feed, alcohol production, and other uses. In the US that would also include ethanol production for motor fuels, but that is probably more minimal in Russia. Though Russians drink more distilled ethanol than Americans.

In 2018 Russia produced 100 million tonnes of grain and exported 40 million, which leaves 70 million consumed domestically. The article points out that the 1 tonne per person is probably high for many countries. It is that for the US.

I looked up some other statistics mentioned in the article and found some interesting numbers. In 2018 there were about 57 million cars registered in Russia and in 2021 there were 146 million cell phones active!
Telecommunication in Russia

Even if Russia's reported population numbers are accurate, most people have at least 2 cell phones.

I was also thinking about an essay Science Fiction author Robert Heinlein wrote about his trip to the USSR in 1960. He and his wife toured Moscow and took some time one day to sit on a park bench and "compare notes". They knew being one of the few western tourists they were probably being watched so they chose an open area to discuss what they were thinking. He had been looking at the transportation logistics and had come to the conclusion that Moscow must be 1/2 the size the Soviets claimed. His wife had been looking at other factors and had come to the same conclusion.

He was left pretty convinced the Soviets were lying about the population of the USSR.

I also came across something a few weeks ago that Rosstat quit actually measuring vital statistics like births and deaths some years ago and they have been reporting made up numbers. Additionally the supposedly measured numbers may have been cooked for a while. The conclusion was that Russia's under 20 population may be much smaller than the official numbers, and the official numbers don't look good for Russia's long term economic health.

I doubt that Russia's population is actually 70 million. But less than 1/2 tonne per person per year is probably a bit low for a country that eats meat, probably doesn't make ethanol for motor fuel, but does make a lot of alcohol for human consumption.

I would guess the population of Russia might be as low as 100 million. It probably isn't the 145 million that Russia claims it is.

I was going to say it is possible that both you and the Heinleins are making the same error of transposing some Western norms onto Russia.

Out in the sticks possibly the mobile phone penetration rate is not very high; and a lot of folk may live off their own vegetable & smallholdings; and transportation use may be very low (at least back then).

But then I pulled out some data and discovered I am wrong on the mobile phones, so maybe you have a valid point on the population. See graph below which is quite an eye opener. (S curves truly are a fantastic thing).

======================

I see this meme is doing the rounds re the continued promotion by the Russians of Crimea as a tourist destination.

=================================

Putting a few cars at a time on that squint bridge section is likely fairly safe. A few cars at 10mph are probably less than the rainload in a heavy storm. Unfortunately.

 

[wdolson]

I was going to say it is possible that both you and the Heinleins are making the same error of transposing some Western norms onto Russia.

Out in the sticks possibly the mobile phone penetration rate is not very high; and a lot of folk may live off their own vegetable & smallholdings; and transportation use may be very low (at least back then).

But then I pulled out some data and discovered I am wrong on the mobile phones, so maybe you have a valid point on the population. See graph below which is quite an eye opener. (S curves truly are a fantastic thing).

View attachment 957960

======================

The 1.6 phones per person is using the 145 million population number. Whatever the population is, the number of phones in circulation in Russia is just nuts. The only explanation I can think of is that burner phones may be very popular for some reason? That would make a lot of those cell phones still technically active, but unused as people moved on to another burner.

I read the Heinlein essay when it was republished in 1988. I read a lot of SF back then, but don't so much anymore, too many demands on my time. I was dredging my memory for the details and it looks like I got some things wrong. Heinlein's analysis was even smaller than I remembered.

The essay itself is not online, but this article heavily quotes from it, including most of the salient parts
Did Robert Heinlein in 1961 predict the fall of the Soviet Union? Lessons learned from this. - Fabius Maximus website

His wife was fluent in Russian and got people talking about their families. She took mental notes of family sizes and concluded that the population was shrinking in 1960, unless, as she put it, they were breeding like flies in the rural areas. Heinlein looked at transport infrastructure into cities and he corroborated his numbers with a serving USN admiral who had come to the same conclusion as Heinlein.

Russia might be trying to hide some very bad demographics data. They have been fronting about everything else, maybe they are fronting about this too?

I see this meme is doing the rounds re the continued promotion by the Russians of Crimea as a tourist destination.

View attachment 957961

=================================

Putting a few cars at a time on that squint bridge section is likely fairly safe. A few cars at 10mph are probably less than the rainload in a heavy storm. Unfortunately.

Funny fake ad for Crimea. I definitely wouldn't want to visit there for a holiday any time soon.

It will probably be a while until the Ukrainians make another attack on the Kerch Bridge. The Russians will be on high alert for a while.

 

[SwedishAdvocate]

Behind paywall, but allegedly...

Russia not only kidnaps children, but also the elderly, British The Telegraph reveals. They are stripped of their Ukrainian passports and are being forced to donate blood, among other things. Many are in such bad condition that they die.

"Children are not the only ones being abducted by Russia​

Elderly and vulnerable Ukrainians left in agony after being taken into Russian territory, Telegraph investigation reveals

By Verity Bowman 20 July 2023 • 9:00am

Elderly and vulnerable Ukrainians were taken into Russian territory, stripped of their citizenship, forced to give blood and left in agony from botched medical procedures, a Telegraph investigation has found [... "

Children are not the only ones being abducted by Russia

Elderly and vulnerable Ukrainians left in agony after being taken into Russian territory, Telegraph investigation reveals

www.telegraph.co.uk

 

[KBF]

that trench line had 6 orcs in it. I know next to nothing here, but that doesn't seem like full strength, but also not the expected meager resources we've been expecting. That trench line had 4 firing lines, and one surveillance spot, so seems like it was fully manned? At the start the commander talks about two groups being there, not one. Which suggests perhaps two groups of three?

<snip>
orc morale did seem bad enough that they broke and ran from the first line of defense. The second line they may have felt they had no choice but to fight.

I agree - compelling video, well produced. It was heavily edited/non-linear, so I think there were a couple of things we have to infer.

From what I gathered, the 1st line of defense was heavily shelled, causing them to flee, and it sounded like these 6 were the ones that made it to this 2nd trench. That, or these were reserves? It wasn't clear. One soldier mentioned he wasn't going to say how many soldiers were there - and I think he's referring to that original trench. Could have been high casualties, and it sounded like many got mowed down in the retreat.

It was interesting that it sounded like this UA infantry unit was quickly digging their own trench in secret, surprising the 'orcs' and evading drone detection - timelines were vague with that, too.

But definitely a high quality mini-documentary/recruitment video ("drone operators are so important", "infantry is the backbone of the army" etc), but also shows some of the adrenaline/fear a front line soldier goes through when storming a trench.

Incidentally, barbed wire was also very conspicuously absent...

 

[petit_bateau]

16 x 155mm SPG ex Italy en route Ukraine as seen in Slovakia. The West is getting the loss replacements into theatre.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1681954003003883520

Two can play blockade game ... ALL ports of Russian Federation and occupied Crimea

https://twitter.com/x/status/1682008775517954051

This will require USA consent so contact your representatives in DC to get it done. The 20 x ex-Polish MiG-29 include lots of USA kit so USA consent needed.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1681727818697195520

Oh dear

https://twitter.com/x/status/1681967451687251968

Wagner PMC losses " Representatives of Wagner PMC revealed how many people were recruited to participate in the special military operation in Ukraine and what losses they suffered: 78,000 mercenaries passed through the Ukrainian mission in total - One of the PMC commanders, Chief of Staff "Marx" 49,000 of them are prisoners from various penal colonies of the Russian Federation. 22,000 mercenaries were killed as of May 20, and 40,000 were wounded. "There are 25,000 left alive and well, plus the wounded and those undergoing treatment. Up to 10,000 of them have left and are leaving for Belarus," "Marx" said." These and the DPR/LPR losses are often not included in the various statistical analyses

https://twitter.com/x/status/1681944116932800512

 

[SwedishAdvocate]

Re: The Russian Dictator's use of cluster munitions.

If anyone missed this picture...

"Police officers in Kharkiv, Ukraine, look at collected fragments of Russian rockets, including cluster rounds on Dec. 3, 2022. (Libkos/AP)"

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/07/20/cluster-munitions-ukraine-war-russia/

Alternative picture source:

https://twitter.com/NOELreports

https://twitter.com/x/status/1681997534225391618

 

[JRP3]

Unmanned mine clearing

https://twitter.com/x/status/1680551344581607428

 

[petit_bateau]

transitioning to a post-Putin Russia, past analogues

Elite CCP Power Struggles : “We need to be extraordinarily careful when we’re looking at those types of material and be sensitive to just how much we don’t know.”

Joseph Torigian’s Prestige, Manipulation, and Coercion: Elite Power Struggles in The Soviet Union and China After Stalin and Mao is one of my favorite China books. Books that deeply engage with both Soviet and CCP primary sources around elite politics basically never come out nowadays.

He puts forward convincing revisionist interpretations of Khrushchev’s triumph after Stalin’s death, had me reconsider my conception of the Gang of Four after Mao’s death, and made me feel for Hua Guofeng getting done dirty by Deng. His new model of how power transitions really work in authoritarian countries with weak institutions left me more scared than hopeful for whatever happens once Xi exits stage left.

With all the drama around Qin Gang and Prigozhin in recent weeks, I figured this would be a good week to run our interview [transcript].

Elite CCP Power Struggles

“We need to be extraordinarily careful when we’re looking at those types of material and be sensitive to just how much we don’t know.”

www.chinatalk.media

 

[madodel]

transitioning to a post-Putin Russia, past analogues

Elite CCP Power Struggles : “We need to be extraordinarily careful when we’re looking at those types of material and be sensitive to just how much we don’t know.”

Joseph Torigian’s Prestige, Manipulation, and Coercion: Elite Power Struggles in The Soviet Union and China After Stalin and Mao is one of my favorite China books. Books that deeply engage with both Soviet and CCP primary sources around elite politics basically never come out nowadays.

He puts forward convincing revisionist interpretations of Khrushchev’s triumph after Stalin’s death, had me reconsider my conception of the Gang of Four after Mao’s death, and made me feel for Hua Guofeng getting done dirty by Deng. His new model of how power transitions really work in authoritarian countries with weak institutions left me more scared than hopeful for whatever happens once Xi exits stage left.

With all the drama around Qin Gang and Prigozhin in recent weeks, I figured this would be a good week to run our interview [transcript].

Elite CCP Power Struggles

“We need to be extraordinarily careful when we’re looking at those types of material and be sensitive to just how much we don’t know.”

www.chinatalk.media

Live by the sword, die by the sword. Actually surprising how many authoritarian leaders died of old age; still in power; subjugating their populace. Mao, Franco, Stalin, Khrushchev, Peron. Keeping people in perpetual fear until the end.

 

[navguy12]

I came across this the other day
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

Translation
В России живут всего 70 миллионов человек?

It looks at food production and consumption numbers to check the numbers on Russia's population. I guess an accepted standard of grain consumption for a country that doesn't have food scarcity is about 1 tonne per person per year. This includes grain that goes into animal feed, alcohol production, and other uses. In the US that would also include ethanol production for motor fuels, but that is probably more minimal in Russia. Though Russians drink more distilled ethanol than Americans.

In 2018 Russia produced 100 million tonnes of grain and exported 40 million, which leaves 70 million consumed domestically. The article points out that the 1 tonne per person is probably high for many countries. It is that for the US.

I looked up some other statistics mentioned in the article and found some interesting numbers. In 2018 there were about 57 million cars registered in Russia and in 2021 there were 146 million cell phones active!
Telecommunication in Russia

Even if Russia's reported population numbers are accurate, most people have at least 2 cell phones.

I was also thinking about an essay Science Fiction author Robert Heinlein wrote about his trip to the USSR in 1960. He and his wife toured Moscow and took some time one day to sit on a park bench and "compare notes". They knew being one of the few western tourists they were probably being watched so they chose an open area to discuss what they were thinking. He had been looking at the transportation logistics and had come to the conclusion that Moscow must be 1/2 the size the Soviets claimed. His wife had been looking at other factors and had come to the same conclusion.

He was left pretty convinced the Soviets were lying about the population of the USSR.

I also came across something a few weeks ago that Rosstat quit actually measuring vital statistics like births and deaths some years ago and they have been reporting made up numbers. Additionally the supposedly measured numbers may have been cooked for a while. The conclusion was that Russia's under 20 population may be much smaller than the official numbers, and the official numbers don't look good for Russia's long term economic health.

I doubt that Russia's population is actually 70 million. But less than 1/2 tonne per person per year is probably a bit low for a country that eats meat, probably doesn't make ethanol for motor fuel, but does make a lot of alcohol for human consumption.

I would guess the population of Russia might be as low as 100 million. It probably isn't the 145 million that Russia claims it is.

My only observation is the stipulation that “most people have at least two cell phones”.

My immediate contacts in my cohort only own and operate one mobile phone at a time (many of us have old ones in junk drawers, but they don’t have SIM cards).

Edit: just seen the chart @petit_bateau posted showing Japan and Russia having a higher number of subscriptions per resident.

 

[madodel]

Not sure what power the Allies have over Kyrgyzstan to stop this.

In Central Asia, a hidden pipeline supplies Russia with banned tech

 

[Tiger]

Not sure what power the Allies have over Kyrgyzstan to stop this.

In Central Asia, a hidden pipeline supplies Russia with banned tech

You cannot stop arbitrage, it's a force of (economic) nature. Everything has a price so long as Russia can afford to pay.

 

[khorton]

Live by the sword, die by the sword. Actually surprising how many authoritarian leaders died of old age; still in power; subjugating their populace. Mao, Franco, Stalin, Khrushchev, Peron. Keeping people in perpetual fear until the end.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding your statement, but Khrushchev died years after being replaced by Brezhnev. Khrushchev was pushed out of office in October 1964. Granted a modest pension, house, dacha and a car, he lived quietly until his death from a heart attack in September 1971.