Cogitation in the Time of War #15 - Lying Lavrov

To summarize, and attempt to make sense, of some of things officially said by Russia, in particular by Lying Lavrov and his diplomatic staff located all over the world.

Russia DIDN'T ATTACK Ukraine, it is a "special military operation" after all, and it "operated" for the following reasons:

Cogitation in the Time of War #14 - A new take on combat losses

Those following me, or are my friends, on Facebook might have noticed, that "coverage" of Putin's Invasion of Ukraine has decreased both in frequency and in intensity. Even in the blog there's a break of more than 48 hours. That also happens because the flux of tweets (it has been my main source of info, by following a couple of relevant and trustworthy accounts, plus a couple of Ukrainian journalists for some more details coming straight from the field) is much lower now. I guess this is normal as the initial shock is now over, the second week of fighting has passed, and the operation is moving slower so there is less changes every day. It somehow stabilised and that lowers the intensity of the outside interest. Time also normalises a situation, so there's that as well.

Cogitation in the Time of War #13 - 8 years of War in Donbas

Antes de passar ao tópico da dissertação queria dizer 2 coisas:

1. Happy International Women's Day, in particular to the warrior women of Ukraine.
3. "In war, truth is the first casualty" (please watch this video); and I just like to add that the winners are the ones that write the History books.

Let's move on to the issue at hand, the 8 year period since March 2014 till Putin's Invasion, a period during which Ukraine and Russia were already at war but unofficially.

Cogitation in the Time of War #12 - Symbologies

The Z letter seen on the Russian vehicles that invaded Ukraine is by now likely familiar to everyone. It even became a symbol in both Russia, where it is used by those supporting Putin and his "special military operation", and in Ukraine as a symbol for tyranny, in the same way that the swastika was a symbol for the Nazi Germany as seen on the collage on top.

Cogitation in the Time of War #11 - Tomorrow is Sunday

Personally it was a nice day for me. It's still cold at night but the sun has been out and shining for 4 days now. We inaugurated the barbecue season, with a mix of meats but also sardines. I spent almost the entire afternoon without checking my phone for news on Putin's Invasion.

The only downside today was that my bicycle's chain broke cycling home (3rd consecutive mechanic failure when riding with my son).

Cogitation in the Time of War #10 - The boys inside the tanks

Yesterday shared on Facebook a video of an allegedly Russian tank being hit/destroyed by an anti-tank missile fired by the Ukrainian forces (the view point is from the sighter, or visor, from the launcher) and I wrote the following joke (now slightly improved):
- Dad, what did you hunt for dinner today?
- A tank, son.
- And can we eat it?
- Not sure, I guess. The turret is already fully cooked.

From the comments on the different Twitter threads where I saw the video being shared, and since the tank seems to be stuck, I simply assumed that it had been abandoned. I did the joke when sharing it myself because it didn't cross my mind that the video could be directly showing the death of the tank's crew (at least the 2 that sit in the turret).
But that was a assumption not a certainty. I didn't remove the post because I couldn't verify later more details on the video and the strike's outcome. I actually encountered some comments claiming that what we see is a sort of bunker and not even a tank! Anyways, this video and my post generated 2 interesting reactions (via comments) that I decided to expand in a dedicated cogitation.

Cogitation in the Time of War #9 - Die of the cure?

This might be mostly based on personal perception but it seems that the general opposing, or the contrarians, view, (as opposed to the main line from Western governments) moved from "NATO caused this war by expanding and forcing Putin's end" to "NATO is leaving Ukraine alone to fight and must do something". Then the "opposition" asks for a no-fly zone (something they picked up somewhere but have no clue about what it really is) or even asks for troops on the ground.

Cogitation in the Time of War #8 - A meme, a summary and a personal thought

The image above is a new Russian meme, apparently doing the rounds in Moscow. Part of the photo widely shared all over the world, with Puting meeting his top 2 generals (Defense Minister and Chief of the General Staff) but them sitting opposite ends of the (extremely) long table

This is a translation of the text (since I don't know Russian nor cyrillic) to English:

- "You are sitting closer to him. Hit [the fuck out of] him with something."

- "Hit him with what, from 20 meters?"

But day #8 of Putin's Invasion of Ukraine is gone and I'm just sharing some thoughts before going to bed.