“So now we are 50 days into this Special Military Operation (SMO) and right in between the end of the first phase and the beginning of the second one.  So, I want to begin by listing a few things which were unclear/ambiguous/misunderstood and which now are becoming clear(er).”

“Still, we need to remember that all wars are political in nature and that while the military “pain dial” is turned up quite high for the Ukrainians, the US PSYOPs are still telling the Ukrainians that they are winning and soon the first Ukie tanks will enter Moscow.  The de facto fall of Mariupol (as evidenced by the desperate attempts to evacuate the Azov leaders by helicopter) is already a major blow for the Ukrainian narrative.  But this blow pales in comparison to what will happen when the best forces the Ukraine has will simply disappear from the maps of the Donbass.  At that point, no amount of hot air, grand statements or other lies will make a difference – such a defeat is impossible to conceal, it will make the news.”

“It took the Russians just a few hours to break up the united Ukrainian armed forces into many smaller chunks.  This was achieved by basically taking out Ukie command and control capabilities.  Then, rather quickly, the Russian invaded from several directions, quickly bypassed the fortified Ukrainian defenses, blocked the units which refused to surrender, and when further.  As a result, cities such as Kharkov or Sumy found themselves deep inside the Russian rear, unable to be resupplied and no hope to evacuate.  In a few special cases, the order was given to gradually tighten the noose around Nazi concentrations while liberating the civilians' neighborhoods, this is what is going in Mariupol.”

“For four weeks now we have been discussing the Russian special military operation in the Ukraine and most of what we looked at was happening either in the Ukraine proper or near it.  I did mention plenty of time that “this is not about the Ukraine, this is about the future collective security arrangement of Europe“, which is true.  But even that does not show the full picture.”

This is more about what is going on in Russia.

“In purely military terms, the picture we see now is simple: the Ukie military as a strategic instrument basically died in the first 24 hours.  Then the Russians used a small force to bypass and block main cities.  With some very notable exceptions (Mariupol) they did not try to enter them.  Why?  For 3 crucial reasons:

they did not have the manpower needed (in Mariupol the force correlation is about 1:1 when it should really be 3-5:1 in favor of the attacker)

they wanted to kill as few Ukrainians as possible and

they did not want to flatten cities only to have to pay for their reconstruction.

So where are the rest of the Russian forces and what are they doing?

They are mostly in their permanent deployment bases and they are ready for a war against the US+NATO.”

First, the biggest news of the day: the city of Izium fell to the Russian forces.

Second, for all practical purposes that cauldron was about 80% closed “by fire” for a few days already, this time it will be closed by Russian/LDNR forces meeting each other somewhere in that big no mans land between Pavlograd and Donetsk.

Third, The encirclement (cauldron) of Odessa is beginning.

Putin – “ If the leadership of Ukraine continues to do what they are doing, it will call into question the future of Ukrainian statehood, and that will be entirely their responsibility”