what the fuck is happening in Russia?

good read: https://www.rferl.org/a/putin-russia-president-1999-chechnya-apartment-bombings/30097551.html

how did these dudes let themselves be taken alive

I've still to read more fully on this so its not a strongly held opinion but one things that spring to mind is the people taken might not necessarily be the people who did it. That would be one reason they let themselves be taken alive, as they didn't know they were going to be taken. It is the one thing that is somewhat surprising

ie if they had escaped, it might be better to at least find someone to stand in for them

They were wearing the exact same shirts in the pre-photo (in front of the IS flag) and in the arrest/torture screenshots. I don't know if they thought they would get away with it and not be dehumanized into nothing for the rest of their lives but they were stupid enough to do this in the first place, not thinking fits.

stop making me conspiracy-pilled

Fwiw I don't think its a conspiracy and I think the attack is almost certainly what it looks like. Its really more like if some Tajiks did it and those particular Tajiks couldn't be located would some other Tajiks do? But given everyone knew an attack was going to take place beforehand its more than likely they were easy enough to locate afterwards. It is weird they missed the opportunity for martyrdom though, that seems to be an intrinsic and fundamental error

they were working on the kill now, martyr later plan

starting to think that perhaps putin wasn’t behind it, they’d plant a stronger link to ukraine
so far the attempts to pin it on ukraine seem pretty desperate (“ukraine denies it, so it must be ukraine!”)

They've pivoted to 'we know IS did it but WHO hired them? I think we would know who'

yeah, they're now implying that the US, UK and Ukraine are somehow behind it, based on absolutely no evidence whatsoever

faking evidence does take time. i’m sure we’ll have some “authentic” confessions soon

lol at lukashenko saying the terrorists tried to flee to ukraine because it would be preferable to belarus
did he not get the memo

its not unlikely that Putin (and inner circle) genuinely thinks the US is behind the attack, because the US is behind everything (including Ukraine)

No way Putin genuinely believes that.

He may not but he will give you a four-hour lecture about it.

He believes the CIA was behind Maidan, he believes the CIA was behind the Arab Spring, so it isn't impossible. His general mindset is that organic instances of protest or action don't really exist, and are manifestations of an exercise of power by a larger entity.

Its also partly why he doesn't think of Ukraine or Slovenia or Costa Rica or Spain as real. To him they are franchises of the US

(citations needed, as usual)

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/31/politics/navalny-russian-prisoner-database-hack/index.html

https://i2-prod.mirror.co.uk/news/us-news/article32404487.ece/ALTERNATES/s1200e/1_sdc_mdg_chp_62818.jpg

what the fuck is happening in Washington D.C.?

Leaving Celtic for the MLS?

the 4 concert hall terrorists are in a video where they say (Chechens speaking Russian, all using the same words) that they were to contact someone in Ukraine.

That's how they earned a bowl of soup

hired by a Putin crony, told someone else hired them, told where to go and when, ambushed on the way back into Ukraine by a waiting military squad who was either in on it or "tipped off" as to their whereabouts.

Russian President Vladimir Putin instructed to remove restrictions on the work of minors in order to cope with the shortage of workers in the economy, which the authorities estimate at hundreds of thousands of people.

The government and the Agency for Strategic Initiatives should consider "promoting employment and stimulating employment" of citizens aged 14 and over, according to a list of Putin's instructions published on the Kremlin's website.

dragging kids into armament factories now

Damn

Probably safer than meatpacking factories at least.

(citations needed, as usual)

Apologies, I think I posted that when I was on the bus on the way into town and forgot to add later. I don't think I noted anything down specifically as I tend to listen to things when running rather than reading but I'll see what I can find

Gleb Pavlovsky Frontline PBS Interview 2017

I wonder how long until Shoigu falls from a window/expires from some mysterious health condition that had previously shown no symptoms of

I think he's 'pretty safe, he hasn't exactly been fired or even demoted. Just looks like a sideways kind of move, and brining in an economics guy as the replacement looks more like gearing up for the long haul

Patrushev is the more interesting move, but at sam time his son got promoted. We're squarely back in reading the tea leaves kremlinology era now, but I think this might not be much more than a simple reshuffle

I was listening to a Russian podcaster saying that this sideways move has much reduced the influence and status of Shoigu to the point that he's practically a nobody now.

Which podcaster?

Technically he's now replacing Patrushev who definitely isn't a nobody! That being said, Patrushev's power and influence is probably contained inside Patrushev and not his office, so it could be this is a case of being promoted out of harms way. But Putin rewards loyalty, arguably above anything else, and Shoigu certainly has a lot of that

oh not someone I'd recommend to anybody, he's an idiot. But he's right about some stuff and badly wrong at other times. Lol, he reckoned Tucker Carlson is a good journalist, that kind of wrong. Sometimes I prefer the bad podcasts just for background noise while I'm washing the dishes and for occasional lolz.

and he tells amusing stories about his childhood in the Soviet Union and stuff from the Yeltsin era, which is always good value.

I'm sort of in two minds when it comes to this stuff. I found the long-form video interviews with the Z patriot medic from Bakhmut and his Wagner mate upthread really interesting. It was good to be able to hear from them directly, by someone that didn't interrupt and gave them the floor.

But if they had controlled the podcast instead of being interviewees, I'd have been less inclined to listen - even though the interviewer barely challenged them at all (which is good! I don't really want interviewers to challenge guests, just ask good, probing, interesting questions, and give them space). But I think there is a need to hear 'wrong answers' too

Not that there is a "wrong answer" to "why did you volunteer to fight in Bakhmut?", so there's kind of nothing to challenge on other than understanding the perspective (as well as the experience)

bump

Popov dubiously arrested for stealing 100m roubles worth of metal after criticising the meat grinder tactics. He seems like someone on borrowed time. He was apparently popular with the rank and file, Putin doesn't like that kind of shit.

has he by any chance a broad yorkshire accent

he could probably do a better Yorkshire accent than Jason Issacs!

Timur Ivanov and Vadim Shamarin also arrested, along with a couple of others, not sure of significance of timing.

These feel separate to the Shoigu move. Shoigu must be delighted with his move

wars with a smile on his face but the lad needs trophies

"Mystery"

Mystery as Russian Judge Dies after Falling from Window
https://www.newsweek.com/russia-judge-dead-natalia-larina-falls-window-1909104

listed a suspected suicide as a cause and said she had left a note

Прощай, жестокий мир!

'goodbye cruel world!'

Another one...

Putin's close ally shot dead in Moscow
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ar-AA1rB5uS

The body of Konstantin Zavizenov was found by his son in a mansion in Moscow's Istra district on Tuesday night, the state news agency RIA Novosti reported. Law enforcement told the news agency that the death was tentatively ruled a suicide, but some expressed doubts about that explanation.

His son found a note and alcohol on a table in the house before hearing a gunshot in another room of the house. According to Russian media reports, Mr Zavizenov's wife had recently caught him having an extramarital affair and had filed for divorce.

News of his death was shared by Ukrainian-born racing driver and political commentator Igor Sushko, who expressed skepticism about claims that Mr. Zavizenov committed suicide

Remember when whats his name drove his tanks up to moscow and DIDNT keep going?