Most experts were already wondering about Putin’s mental state when he decided to forego the relatively quick, easy, and safe option of sending Russian troops into the two breakaway republics to consolidate and pacify them, declare their independence, and withdraw, leaving a permanent land corridor between the republics and Russia. Instead he went for broke in a widespread invasion, and fucked it up.
Nobody thought that the myriad of sanctions that the US, UK, and EU laid on Putin and Russia would have any real effect for months or even years. Not true. The allies found the secret sauce to begin causing economic hardship on ordinary citizens long before Putin or the oligarchs feel it. And now they’re in the streets.
But the pressure is now coming from everywhere. It has been widely reported that it was Putin personally, much like Hitler before him, who drew up the battle plans, the generals are just carrying out the orders. And they’re fucking it up. They waited too long, and are now restricted to the roads, since the open fields are marshes that will bog down the heavy equipment.
But all you have to do to know how things are really going is to watch the behaviour of Putin and those around him. He is clearly losing his shit. For instance
- The daughter of Putin’s personal spokesman posted on social media that the war must end, only to pull it down hours later. I wonder if the kid is sharing a lunch table with Alexei Novalny yet?
- The Russian stock market has been closed for a week, following its collapse. Putin may be able to bullshit the populace, but the markets run on facts, and they know only too well what will happen the next time that trading bell rings
- As as result, today the 2nd largest oil company in Russia called for an immediate end to the war, and came as close as you can get to actually criticising Putin. They can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh Lawd
- It was reported today that several oligarchs suddenly decided to take extended vacations in The Maldives, an archipelago nation in the Indian Ocean with great hotels and white sandy beaches. And something even more important. No extradition treaty with Russia. If their wealth keeps shrinking, watch for them to start bitching long distance
- The last remaining independent television station left in Russia today chose to shut down rather than become another propaganda mouthpiece of the Kremlin
- For once, Putin is losing the social media misinformation war. His troll farms are running on a script, and today put out that the Zelinsky government has already fallen, and the Russian army is supervising new, free elections. Meanwhile, Ukraine social media is shooting plenty of videos into Russia showing Russians bombing schools and apartment buildings, and Zelinksy strutting around in a helmet and body armor
Of course all of this is falling directly on Putin’s shoulders, and he isn’t handling it particularly well. And when you watch what you can see of his facial expressions and mannerisms, as well as his actions, you can tell
- In the last week, Putin has made more hour long, rambling, disjointed speeches to his people than he has in the last two years. And in them, he continues to insist that his only goal is the DeNazification of the Ukrainian government, led by a Jewish President, while the Russians bombard the National Holocaust Remembrance Museum in Kiev. A Holocaust Remembrance Museum being something I don’t think Moscow has
- Putin continues to insist that the invasion is advancing on schedule. This while it took the Russian army 7 days to finally take a city of 300,000 people only 20 miles from the Belarus border. This while he has a 40 mile long convoy stalled 10 miles from Ukraine, partly due to conscripts deserting to surrender, and stopping to disable the vehicles as they go. If the Ukrainian air force could get up a half a dozen fighters with sidewinder missiles, that column would never move again
- Putin sent a peace negotiating team led by a freakin’ junior Minister of Culture to negotiate. It was an obvious joke and time waster. And today the junior minister successfully negotiated a humanitarian corridor, where fighting would stop for refugees to get out, and humanitarian supplies to get in, the last thing in the world Putin wanted. I wonder if that kid is sharing the lunch table with Novalny and the spokesman’s daughter yet
- But here’s my favorite. Putin, furious of the domestic protests to his war, is crafting a law that would immediately conscript Russian protesters into the army, put them in uniform, give them guns, and send them to the front in Ukraine to fight for national honor
I can’t help but wonder, has Putin never heard of Vietnam? I guess the American slang fragging doesn’t translate into Russian very well. Gimme a break, willya! I just wrote that one of the reasons that Putin’s 40 mile convoy being stalled is due to conscripts deserting and disabling their vehicles on their way out the door. And now Putin wants to take 6,000 anti war protesters, stick them in the army, give them a fully loaded AK-47, and send them to the front?
Question for ya Mad Vlad. How do you figure to get 6,000 unwilling conscripts to the combat zone? By best guess is by truck convoy. And if you think that if you have Russian conscripts who have already been in the army for years are bailing out, and disabling their vehicles, how in the hell do you figure to stop 6,000 pissed off dissidents from doing the same? And maybe taking a few highly trained officers out on their way. That isn’t stupidity, it’s military malpractice.
I’ll close with one more sniglet to buttress the point I made in the previous paragraph. NBC News is reporting from Moscow that high speed trains from Moscow to the border are starting to look like refugee trains out of Ukraine, packed to the gills. And it’s mostly younger and middle aged people, and the luggage they’re hauling with them shows that they’re splitting for good. His own population is voting with their feet. If this keeps up, watch for Putin to come out and declare travel restrictions. He can’t have his cannon fodder boogying out on him.
One note on that last independent TV station in Russia shutting down: its final broadcast was a video of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. That was last seen in 1991 during the attempted coup on Gorbachev before State TV too was shut down. They’re saying what the more levelheaded of us are all thinking: he’s done.
On a deep level, he knows this, has known this since the start. That’s why he’s pulling a Russian Macbeth right now…all this is his last will and testament, an angry suicide note.
Mr Murphy, President Zelensky is NOT “strutting around” in helmet and body armor. He’s leading his people in helmet and body armor. He’s already survived at least three documented assassination attempts by death squads sent by Putin.