Oorlog in Oekraïne #926 Sinking ducks

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North Korea's arms sales to Russia expected to revive its economy from decline
DPRK's economy, which has been shrinking over the past five years, is anticipated to return to growth with an approximate 1% increase in 2024, thanks to its arms sales to Russia

This year, North Korea is expected to see its first economic growth in many years due to the sale of artillery shells and missiles to Russia, which are being used in the war against Ukraine, reports Deutsche Welle.

Since August 2023, North Korea has sent at least ten shipments of ammunition to Russia – roughly one million shells, according to South Korean intelligence. In early January 2024, it was revealed that Russia began receiving ballistic missiles from North Korea, using the first North Korean ballistic missiles in attacks on December 29 and January 2.

The agreements between North Korea and Russia are secret, and both parties deny them.

However, while these deals are described as an "act of desperation" for Russia, they are considered a "mega-deal" for North Korea, DW analyst Anvita Basu from Fitch Solutions said.

The total value of the sold munitions is estimated to be several billion dollars, a significant amount for North Korea's small economy (valued at just $24.5 billion).

"The economy [of North Korea] has been shrinking over the last five years. Therefore, the arms deal with Russia will help it return to growth, approximately 1% in 2024," Basu stated.

She said that her forecast is speculative, as North Korea does not disclose economic data. Most statistical information has to be gathered from the central bank of South Korea and North Korea's trade partners.

Eminem "Kim" (Music Video) 2021

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 22:42 schreef Ulx het volgende:
Op een stuk of twintig op hetzelfde moment of zo.

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 22:42 schreef Ulx het volgende:

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Klopt. Ik ben benieuwd hoe Oekraïne ze gaat demonstreren. Ik hoop op flink aantal doelen tegelijkertijd. Op een stuk of twintig op hetzelfde moment of zo. Even de schok en chaos maximaliseren. Het lijkt me prima om het moreel van Russische troepen zo een dreun te geven.

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Russia imprisoned 12 scientists in the field of hypersonics, three of them dead
Russia has imprisoned at least 12 physicists who studied physical processes at hypersonic speeds.

The BBC reported on this.

According to the publication, the detained scientists were convicted under the article “high treason”. So far, three of them have died.

The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation began to take an active interest in scientists in this field after 2018. It was then that Russia launched an active PR campaign for its own hypersonic missiles and tested them.

Soon after, several physicists were arrested at the Central Research Institute of Machine Building (TsNIIMash), the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute named after N.E. Zhukovsky (TsAGI), and the Khristianovich Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics (ITAM SB RAS).

At the Khristianovich Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics, the main suspects were director Alexander Shiplyuk and chief scientists Alexander Maslov and Valery Zvegintsev. The first two were accused of transferring secret technologies to China.

According to Western media, Valery Zvegintsev was also accused of transferring hypersonic technology to Iran because of the publication of similar information in a local magazine, which he used for internal use.

A case of treason was also opened against a leading expert, a physicist from the Central Research Institute of Machine Building, V. Kudryavtsev. Under strange circumstances, he did not live to see the start of the trial.

The same fate befell another scholar, Roman Kovalev, who was found dead a few weeks after his release from custody.

Another deceased was Dmitry Kolker, head of the Laboratory of Quantum Optical Technologies at the Institute of Laser Physics, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. After his arrest, he was taken to the detention center directly from the hospital with stage four cancer, where he died two days later.

In private conversations between lawyer Yevgeny Smirnov and officers of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, they noted that the detentions were carried out by the order “from above”. In addition, the investigators explicitly stated that they would report to Putin on every such case against scientists.

Smirnov also added that such attention to the scientists on the part of the FSB is connected with the pretense that Western intelligence services are hunting for Russian missile technology.

The FSB’s work consisted of searching for the most suitable international projects of scientists over the past 10-15 years to accuse a person of treason.

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 22:51 schreef Ulx het volgende:
Je weet dat ze ook vanuit de container zelf afgeschoten kunnen worden?

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 22:51 schreef Ulx het volgende:

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Je weet dat ze ook vanuit de container zelf afgeschoten kunnen worden? Zonder M270 of M142?

Verder, zelfs met één m142 is het niet zo'n probleem: 1 salvo is gedaan in één minuut. Wegwezen naar volgende punt. Daar herladen, duurt vijf minuten. Op die manier kun je binnen een uurtje in een enorm gebied flink wat shit schoppen.

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 22:47 schreef Delenlill het volgende:
https://mil.in.ua/en/news(...)-three-of-them-dead/
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Gevaarlijk om wetenschapper in Rusland te zijn.

Meer informatie in het artikel van de BBC waar ze naar verwijzen als bron:
https://www.bbc.com/russian/articles/c72gzl380k7o

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 23:07 schreef spicymchaggis het volgende:

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Mooi dat wetenschappers, die hun intelligentie aanwenden om het mogelijk te maken dat hun intellectueel minder begaafde volksgenoten hun misdadige achterlijkheid kunnen botvieren op hun buurvolkeren, zelf ook slachtoffer worden van diezelfde achterlijkheid.

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 23:06 schreef Ulx het volgende:

[..]

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 23:10 schreef Ulx het volgende:

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Ja, het vult een mooi gat op tussen SCALP/Stormshadow en de M30/M31 en die Duitse met AT-mijnen qua bereik en mogelijkheden. Voor de zware doelen gebruik je de eerste gewoon. De rest zet je in waarvoor het handig is.

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 23:11 schreef Cilantro het volgende:
[ twitter ]

Big if true.

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 23:09 schreef Jaroon het volgende:

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Dwang speelt mss ook een rol.

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 20:29 schreef Anton91 het volgende:
Zag dat plaatje net op Dumpert....(maar kon 'm niet linken en die van gister stond er ook nog niet op) Ben benieuwd of het Oekraïne de komende tijd lukt om de zwarte zee vloot nog meer schade aan te brengen en wat voor gevolgen dat gaat hebben voor Rusland of de Krim.
[ afbeelding ]

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Op vrijdag 2 februari 2024 23:17 schreef Ulx het volgende:

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Het zijn raketten met AT mijnen om snel op afstand een mijnenveld voor aanstormende tanks neer te leggen. Kunnen ook gewoon met een M142 worden afgeschoten. En nee, gewoon interesse. Kom wel uit een marine familie.

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Top Kremlin Propagandist Wants Milbloggers ‘Eliminated’ for Reporting on Disastrous Russian Attack
Russian commanders had big hopes for tank-tipped assault and backed it with smoke trucks, air strikes and heavy flame throwers. Cheap Ukrainian kamikaze drones cut the attack to pieces.

Top Moscow propagandist Vladimir Solovyev in a Thursday evening broadcast demanded that Russian military bloggers responsible for making public video of a recent Russian tank assault’s near-total annihilation by Ukrainian drones and criticizing army leadership for allowing the battlefield disaster to happen be “destroyed – just eliminated.”

As anchorman on a nightly news program aired nationwide on the Kremlin-controlled Russia-1 television channel, Solovyev is the highest-profile advocate of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its elimination as an independent state.

“They [Russian milbloggers] are spreading around video showing [Ukrainian] strikes on our combat vehicles. I say those people need to be arrested and put in jail. Who are they doing this for? For our soldiers? For our commanders? Are they trying to help? No! They are here, dragging Russian society into negative information,” Solovyev said in his daily Vblog Polniy Kontakt.

“These people need to be identified and jailed. All these people on Telegram, bloggers… they are enemies and they must be fought with by the most brutal methods. If you are spreading disinformation, you should be destroyed – just eliminated,” Solovyev said.

Ukrainian military information platforms on Monday and Tuesday published drone video of a Jan. 30 Russian tank and armored personnel carrier attack against positions held by Ukraine’s 72nd Mechanized Infantry Brigade near the Donbas town Novomykhailivka.

Russian video of the ambitious attack, published on Monday, showed a heavy TOS-1 armored flamethrower tank launching rockets and Russian air strikes on Ukrainian positions. According to Russian “war correspondent” Boris Rozhin, Kremlin forces led off the assault with a truck rigged to make a thick smoke screen along the road the armored attack was to follow, and early official Russian army statements claimed the assault gained almost a kilometer of ground.

Ukrainian images published a day later, geolocated to the road and fields east of the town showed at least 12 Russian armored vehicles, among them three tanks, advancing in a well-separated column before coming under attack repeatedly by kamikaze drones.

Most of the hits depicted show a light quad-copter drone with a Soviet-era RPG anti-tank rocket grenade strapped to the bottom of the aircraft hitting the relative thin side or rear armor of Russian T-72 tanks or MTLB armored personnel carriers. Russian vehicles are equipped with anti-drone screens, but the Ukrainian aircraft repeatedly avoid the screens by flying underneath them.

A 2:25-minute compilation video published by an attack drone unit called Bulava showed five drone strikes on T-72s, multiple hits on personnel carriers, and drones hunting down and detonating near retreating Russian foot soldiers.

Other Ukrainian video showed two stopped Russian tank-sized vehicles visibly similar to a TOS-1 heavy flamethrower, one burning. More images showed artillery strikes and drone attacks against apparently abandoned and stationary Russian tanks and armored personnel carriers littering the battlefield.

Information published with the Bulava video said the Russian attack lasted three hours, and Kremlin forces lost a total of three tanks, seven MTLB armored personnel carriers, and one BMP 2 infantry fighting vehicle in the battle. Video first published by Ukrainian army command, and associated with 72nd Mechanized Brigade confirmed some but not all of the Russian losses. Ukrainian army spokesmen on Wednesday said actual Russian losses probably were higher.

Independent Ukrainian military journalist Yuriy Butusov in a Thursday article confirmed the video was authentic and that the Russian attacks took place. The assaults, he said, failed primarily due to repeated Ukrainian kamikaze drone attacks: “This was, probably, one of the clearest demonstrations of the dominance of drones which, in some tactical circumstances, replace artillery on the battlefield.”

Both the Bulava drone unit and 72nd Brigade very likely operate in the Novomykhailivka sector and recently published video associated with those units matched terrain around the town. Drone tactics as shown in the videos were also a close match with successful tactics used by Ukraine strike drone units operating in the southern Kherson sector, Kyiv Post research found.

Contradicting Kremlin claims of a successful attack, Russian milbloggers quickly confirmed Ukrainian reports of heavy Russian losses at Novomykhailivka to drone swarms. According to many pro-Kremlin military information platform operators, the Russian army leadership’s continuing failure to develop effective defenses against strike drones there and at other locations amounts to negligence.

“Once again, our column was cut to bits by [Ukrainian] drones. Novomykhailivka. There is no protection from the sky. No small-caliber air defense weapons, no small-scale jamming,” fumed Maksim Kalashnikov, a popular milblogger, in a Feb. 1 post. “What is the point of these attacks? So that [senior Russian army commanders] can report they are taking decisive action, and so that they can earn medals by throwing away the lives of their own people?”

Although clearly directed in general against milbloggers like Maksim Kalashnikov, Solovyev’s mentioned no one by name in his demand that Russians posting the negative reports should be jailed forthwith.

“About today’s attempt by our warriors to attack in the area of Novomykhailivka… Honestly, I don’t know what to say, about how it could be possible that on 30.01.2024 the generals and admirals planning this attack couldn’t factor in FPV drones,” complained the widely read (750,000+ followers) pro-Moscow blogger Porvernutie Na Z Voine in a diatribe against military leadership.

“How is it possible to allow oneself to lose so much military equipment, so many people? This is total cowardice and total incompetence. In the Russian army right now, there is NO collective defense against the enemy’s drones. What is installed on our vehicles has long become obsolete, it doesn’t cover frequencies now used by the enemy. The only ones who are trying to help are volunteers. The big factories can do nothing with field unit protection [against drones] and they’re sitting with gravy in their pants, before the army and the defense ministry. This problem needs an emergency response!” the Jan. 31 post said.

On Friday spokesmen for Ukraine’s 46th Mechanized Brigade, a combat formation according to unit statements deployed adjacent to the Novomykhailivka sector, said Russian forces had shifted the focus of attacks some 10 kilometers north toward Ukrainian positions around the city Maryinka, scene of repeated Russian assaults since Nov. 2023. These new Russian assaults are, as before, making little progress, 46th Brigade’s Feb. 2 news feed claimed.

In commentary a good deal more sarcastic than conventional for a Ukrainian combat formation, the unit public affairs officer confirmed Russian military blogger complaints about poor Kremlin attack tactics used around Novomykhailivka on Monday and claimed on Friday that they were being attempted again near Maryinka, with similar results.

“Do you remember how the orcs lost 11 combat vehicles near Novomykhailivka? Well, now they’re trying the Maryinka sector… And sometimes the enemy awakens an ancient, natural instinct of the Soviet idiot. An instinct based on the philosophy that losses are okay because [Russian] women will give birth to more children,” the situation update said.

“This is an instinct that says ‘What is an FPV-Drone? From what unit? It’s always mine! We weren’t taught this at the [Russian] General Staff.’ And so, the Soviet idiot sends his cannon fodder toward us [Ukrainian defenses] and we meet them. We are glad the Soviet idiot is on their side. We are appreciative, that there are people on the other side, who still think that a tank can survive and attack 2-3 kilometers from the line of contact, in an open field, during daylight. Eight combat vehicles attacked us, four have been destroyed, and four more just refused to drive forwards us,” the 46th Brigade account of fighting in the Maryinka sector on Friday morning said.