... And that should kill off all passenger flights into and out of Moscow...

Regardless of how Putin tries to 'explain away' the downing of the passenger plane...


Quite a big "Ouch!" for Russia...

Stay safe folks!
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

If Yevgeniy Prigozhin really is dead, he suffered less and for a shorter time than many of the innocent civilians and captured soldiers his hired thugs murdered at his command, so he should count himself fortunate.

---

When one dances with the devil, one must beware that the devil sometimes win. :-)
How much longer before Pootin runs out of dance partners?

One must now be concerned about the future of Wagner, or more precisely how do their thousands of mercenaries around the world behave. Do they shrivel away? Do they go on a indiscriminate killing rampage to avenge their leader? Do they go on "targeted" killing spree? Or what??

---

Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

'Accident'?

Assassination?

Or incompetence??...

Prigozhin and Utkin are said to have been on the same plane at the same time? After their strange mutiny? Over Russian territory? Plane exploded in the air and burnt down on the ground?

Maskirovka!

[EDIT]: btw... Putin no longer flies; since the beginning of the war he has only traveled in his armored train disguised as an ordinary Russian Railways train. His whereabouts are secret (identical office design in his villas and palaces). Prigozhin knows that too. He's not stupid.

'Accident'?

Assassination?

Or incompetence??...

Prigozhin and Utkin are said to have been on the same plane at the same time? After their strange mutiny? Over Russian territory? Plane exploded in the air and burnt down on the ground?

[EDIT]: btw... Putin no longer flies; since the beginning of the war he has only traveled in his armored train disguised as an ordinary Russian Railways train. His whereabouts are secret (identical office design in his villas and palaces). Prigozhin knows that too. He's not stupid.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ten-killed-private-jet-crash-north-moscow-tass-2023-08-23/ wrote:

Russian investigators said they had opened a criminal investigation. Some unnamed sources told Russian media they believed the plane had been shot down by one or more surface-to-air missiles. Reuters could not confirm that.

Since Wagner shot down some Russian planes on his little adventure, it would be a fitting revenge.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ten-killed-private-jet-crash-north-moscow-tass-2023-08-23/ wrote:

Russian investigators said they had opened a criminal investigation. Some unnamed sources told Russian media they believed the plane had been shot down by one or more surface-to-air missiles. Reuters could not confirm that.

Since Wagner shot down some Russian planes on his little adventure, it would be a fitting revenge.

Russia lies all the time... a centuries-old behaviour of Russian officials that is reflected in hundreds of variations in idioms; also in the literature:

"The rules are simple: They lie to us, we know they're lying, they know we know they are lying but they keep lying anyway, and we keep pretending to believe them."

source: Elena Gorokhova, "A Mountain of Crumbs - Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain", Random House, 2010, p. 181.

The only indication that makes me doubt a lie is the date: August 23rd. Exactly two months to the day after Prigozhin's uprising began. Such attacks on anniversaries or memorable days seem to be Putin's signature and are always part of the message. Putin critic Anna Politkovskaya, for example, was assassinated on October 7, 2006 in the elevator of her apartment block in central Moscow, exactly on Putin's birthday.

I wonder what PooTin thinks of this.

‘Expect us’: Wagner mercenaries issue warning to PooTin after grisly demise of leader Yegevney Prigozhin.

I like the last paragraph.

“While Putin has eliminated this most recent challenge to his rule, his quagmire in Ukraine continues and other challengers are sure to follow. The next one might not miss.”

Perhaps at some point people in the West have to start thinking about supplying weapons to Wagner. This could quickly lead to the withdrawal of Russian troops and end the war in Ukraine. This is just a cynical joke after some reading about the 1917-1922 Russian Civil War and all sorts of interventions from Entente powers. Of course, it can also have unforeseeable consequences, such as the German step in 1917 to let the revolutionaries around Vladimir Ilyitch Ulyanov, alias "Lenin", leave their Swiss exile via Sweden and Finland for Petrograd, Russia.

Where have they gone?

Wagner Group Flees Belarus Following Prigozhin's Death.

Meanwhile.

PooTin Defectors Fighting for Ukraine Invite Wagner Troops To Switch Sides.

T wonder what PooTin will make of that.

Unfortunately...


EU imports of Russian liquified gas leap by 40% since Ukraine invasion

wrote:

Pipeline flows from Russia have fallen to historic lows, but shipments of LNG from all over the world have surged

EU imports of Russian liquified natural gas (LNG) have increased by 40% ... bought more than half of Russia’s LNG on the market...

... “EU countries now buy the majority of Russia’s supply, propping up one of the Kremlin’s most important sources of revenue,”...

... “Buying Russian gas has the same impact as buying Russian oil. Both fund the war in Ukraine, and every euro means more bloodshed...

... limiting imports of LNG from Russia was only possible if there was prior European agreement. “Until such an agreement is in place, we’ve asked operators not to renew their LNG purchase contracts with Russia,”...

Yet another "loophole" to plug?...

We are long overdue to go truly green and come clean...


All in our deadly politics and dirty business,
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

Long term consequences:


Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia to end Russian grid reliance in 2025
wrote:

The Prime Minister of Estonia has said that the Baltic states will decouple themselves from the Russian power grid in 2025.

Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have relied on Russia’s power grid since splitting from the Soviet Union in 1991. They, alongside Belarus and Russia itself, make up the BRELL (Belarus, Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) ring...

... All three Baltic countries must divest from Russian grid reliance [simultaneously] together, and while Litgrid will continue to lobby for an earlier decoupling, Lithuania and Latvia must abide by Estonia’s timeline.

Masiulis reasoned that the states decoupling from the Russian grid at the earliest opportunity was the right thing to do in order to oppose Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He also added that he doesn’t “think it is the right choice to keep cooperating with the aggressor just because this saves a few cents”.

Kallas stated that the three Baltic states will declare their formal application to decouple from the BRELL ring in August 2024.

Note that Putin attempted to sabotage the Ukrainian power grid when it tested decoupling from the Russian power system.

That decoupling test became permanent as Putin almost immediately invaded...


All in deadly games of politics...
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

Long term consequences:

Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia to end Russian grid reliance in 2025 wrote:

Note that Putin attempted to sabotage the Ukrainian power grid when it tested decoupling from the Russian power system.

That decoupling test became permanent as Putin almost immediately invaded...

The decoupling of the Baltics is long overdue. This should have happened at the latest with the invasion of Crimea, when it became apparent that Putin was ignoring every international law and every international treaty. Extensive investments in the Baltic power grid were required first: More redundant links had to be built, that bypass Russia's Kaliningrad region, for example. HVDC subsea links to Sweden and Finland were built. Furthermore, a high-capacity link to the Polish grid was necessary, as this will be the only synchronous AC link to the continental grid after decoupling. As long as the Baltic states are part of the BRELL synchronous ring, the Polish link requires an expensive DC/DC back-to-back converter. These investments overwhelmed the small Baltic countries and the EU should have spent a lot of money long ago to complete this process quickly. As with everything related to Russia, Putin's destructive policies have been ignored for too long because it was most convenient.

Otherwise there is still a large generation deficit in the entire Baltic region, which arose as a result of the forced shutdown of Soviet-era nuclear power plants as a condition for EU accession. Baltic states should think again if it wouldn't be more resilient to have sufficient (CO2 friendly) generation capacity locally in the Baltics instead of relying on extensive imports. Some few transit links and subsea cables are easily destroyed, for example in hybrid wars where the attacker remains hidden.

Ukraine added a new category to its list of destroyed Russian weapons systems: Submarines. Yesterday's attack on a dry dock in Sevastopol/Crimea appears to have destroyed a large landing ship and a (diesel-powered) submarine of Russia's Black Sea Fleet.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66793900

Apparently info just released reckons NATO came close to being drawn into war by a stupid orc a year ago.

‘Unbelievably reckless’: Russian fighter jets’ blunder almost started world war, military experts say

Bungling Russian pilots put the world one step away from war by firing two missiles at a British spy plane, former military commanders have said.

Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, a former UK officer, blasted the “unbelievable reckless incompetence” of Vladimir Putin’s forces while speaking to The Sun.

The unarmed British plane was on a routine patrol in international airspace last September when it was tailed by two Russian Su-27 fighter jets.

During the 90-minute interaction, one of the jets fired two missiles near the British plane, with the pilot thinking he had permission to do so.

According to a Western source, the pilot misinterpreted the words “you have the target” as permission to fire.

Sources said the first missile launched successfully but failed to lock onto the target – suggesting it was a failed intentional attack, rather than a “malfunction”, as Russia has since claimed......

Apparently the 2nd missile fell straight into the sea.

During that latest attack upon Russian held Crimea:

Is the rumour true of a one hour outage of StarLink during that attack?...

And three drone boats were lost?...


Stay safe folks?
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

That was during last year's attack on Crimea Martin. There's a link about it buried here somewhere, but this is the fallout from it.

Musk on Starlink Scandal: Ukraine ‘Not in Charge’ of U.S..

The Ukrainians used a different internet link not long after that to complete that mission.

Tue Sep 12, 2023:
https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/12/23871162/spacex-starlink-network-outage

At 8:33PM ET, the company acknowledged the issue and said it was working on a fix. “Starlink is currently in a network outage and we are actively implementing a solution,” SpaceX wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

Downdetector shows there were around 33,000 user reports of problems. Reports started to spike at about 7:30PM ET.

The Ukrainians used a different internet link not long after that to complete that mission.

I think that's the tricky thing here. Sat services in geostationary orbits like INMARSAT require alignment of the planar antenna with the satellite (most newer airline jets have such antenna domes on the rear upper fuselage). Difficult with small sea drones shaken by sea swell that zigzag at high speed to avoid defensive fire. Satellite networks operating in low polar orbits, such as Iridium or Thuraya (geosychronous with regional spot beams) don't require aligned antennas but are unlikely to provide live video streams in sufficient bandwidth (and latency!). Starlink is a groundbreaking innovation in this regard---thus a stategic weapon system controlled by one men, Elon Musk.

It would also be interesting to know which sat services Russia is able to disrupt in the Black Sea region through jamming.