By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with When the Ukrainian and NATO forces have lost their war in eastern Ukraine by Christmas, what will happen to the rump of western Ukraine? The Russian warning, issued last Friday at the Security Council by President Vladimir Putin,  is that the Russian Army will defend western Ukraine, known as Galicia, […]

by Editor - Wednesday, July 26th, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with President Vladimir Zelensky has enough fingers to count that $115 billion is worth almost three times more than $41.3 billion. The first number is the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) calculation of  “external support over 2023–27 involving sizable official financing in the form of grants and concessional loans, as well as […]

by Editor - Wednesday, July 26th, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with Russia’s warning to Poland not to send troops into the western Galician region of the Ukraine has fallen on deaf ears in Warsaw. Instead, electioneering ahead of an October national parliamentary vote has dictated different priorities for the governing party, the main opposition party, and the rising Konfederacja (“Confederation”) party. […]

by Editor - Monday, July 24th, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with Soldiers lay down smoke on the battlefield to conceal their movements, advancing or retreating, from the troops on the other side. In the US Army manuals for warfighting with smoke, there are four kinds for the battlefield (lead image) – obscuring smoke which is aimed at blinding the enemy so […]

by Editor - Sunday, July 23rd, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with Officially speaking, the Russians ended the year-long Black Sea Grain Initiative by refusing to renew it on July 17. Practically, it has been doomed for weeks.  The Ukrainian attacks on the Togliatti-Odessa ammonia pipeline (June 8) and the Taman ship-loading terminal (June 2); Ukrainian efforts to use the grain carriers […]

by Editor - Friday, July 21st, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with On the battlefield the Ukraine has pioneered the Mosquito Tactic – that’s sending units of dozens of soldiers running towards Russian defence fortifications in several swarms at the same time, across a half-dozen salients up and down the line of contact. In parallel, in the air and on the sea […]

by Editor - Wednesday, July 19th, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with In war, the losing side has several options. Fighting to the death is one of them, capitulation and surrender are another. Depending on their rank, religion, honour, and offshore bank accounts, the losers may run away or commit suicide. The Ukrainian regime, with the assistance of the North Atlantic Treaty […]

by Editor - Sunday, July 16th, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with For all its public talk, NATO has agreed on a secret six-month plan for Ukraine. It’s a case of do or die by December. Either the Ukrainian forces, firing everything the NATO allies can give them — from US cluster munitions to Franco-English Storm Shadow missiles and German Leopard tanks […]

by Editor - Wednesday, July 12th, 2023
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Translated from Colonel Cassad, with afterword by John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with Damage control Today it’s a little funny to see the bewilderment from reports of Putin’s meeting with Prigozhin, because, they say, Putin had called Prigozhin a rebel, and then meets with him.

by Editor - Monday, July 10th, 2023
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By John Helmer, Moscow   @bears_with In the current war with the US, the monetary policy of the Central Bank of Russia and of its governor, Elvira Nabiullina (lead image, right), has been criticized in the State Duma and in the domestic media for catastrophic negligence in exposing the Bank’s currency reserves to the US freeze […]

by Editor - Monday, July 10th, 2023
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