She could already be dead. They have a hierarchy of who gets to know upon death and how the media will be handled.
Already in storage ready to be sold. There will be a London mint ad for a gold sovereign by this evening.
She licked Liz Truss? My first thought was it didn't take her long to kill the Queen after becoming PM. She survived Thatcher and Boris only to be killed by Truss.
It's probably a degree of coping with idiocy. Her health's gone down hill rapidly watching boris but it seems seeing Truss walk in has been too much
I wonder how ancient Egyptians felt when Ramses II died. I suspect the self flagellation was not as severe
Some of them probably really believed he was a God. North Korea is probably a good parallel for ancient Egypt. They do weep when they lose a dear leader.
most probably did but it didn't stop them robbing the tomb and smashing up all his children's corpses for jewellery. (KV5 is massive and there's literally nothing but bone fragments in the antechambers where they were all smashed up. But equally they didn't put off harvesting field nor whatever and most of them probably only got told months after as the news slowly percolated out.
Things look very dicey in ukraine right now. It seems the russians have ran out of men and drew down too many to shore up kherson but as everyone (who's not self flagellating over the queen) has seen theres been massive moves in the east. It looks now like the Ukrainians have not only chased after the small russian forces left to kill civilians i nthe east with shelling but have past that river barrier and are threatening to pinch out a massive salient of area leaving russians cut off. Apparently on 25km from severodenstsk driving up form south/centre and reaching svatove in north. This seems rather a lot of territory to cover with their forces and the big risk is russians mobilise full army and drive in to them in a few weeks. please log in to view this image meanwhile sorties are now emerging that its not as stalemate as assumed around kherson either. please log in to view this image seems to be a bit of progress here also in the last 24 hours but its new blackouts to stop russians using it. the news thats come out in the east must mean that the Ukrainians feel the russians have nothing left to take advantage of info in the short term.
The other bit of important news is that the people in these areas that the Russians have been saying want independence have been greeting the returning armies as liberators so it's killing Russian PR propaganda that this is some sort of moral war. (Not that many left that believe that). For a few weeks now we've been reading stories about how the tide has turned and how Russia is running out of men and weapons, etc, but no positive movement until the last four days or so. The real question is, and it's a big IF at this point... what happens if Ukraine keeps pushing Russia back and what if they reach Crimea? How likely are Russia to do something really stupid if they look like they're going to lose Crimea that they took back in 2014 when the first part of the conflict began? That's not just going to be losing a war. That's going to be a massive loss of faith, and a loss of territory that they had taken. Zelenskyy has always said the aim is to win back Crimea too.
I think russia will scrape up some forces off other fronts but leave the interior exposed to revolution Inevitably if 150k real troops out of 1million or 2 million are committed and getting creamed daily then another 150k will be found. The issue for me is these gains have come about through russia going and doing what they have done twice already. They pulled out of kyiv area and moved forces east. they redeployed and went on a grinding artillery battle after battle approach to sorched earth though the donbas. The forces in the south were largely untouched so have had 6 months to be ready i suppose. once the attack hit there the russian again moved forces south to meet this and now the Ukrainians have somehow had the forces to do go push on a quoted 8:1 force level then its merely a quick push past front line and now a drive to the border etc. This can easily all go wrong again as they meet some resistance somewhere and slow up. theres a massive difference in driving up to the russian border and holding all those towns and villages now. If the russians assemble another attack force they will drive right back through all these areas. In the south really the Ukrainians can only pin the russians to the river and fight them til they break or not. that will be really expensive and then they will need to swing round so the crimea is not under any immediate threat, probably not in 2022 frankly if the Russians get the winter to regroup and rearm then they will come sailing back with an even nastier bunch of scum In the end nobody in russia thus far has been willing to take out the dictator and shoot him and realistically the same sorts will merge after him.
Its like China a few decades ago. You can have a billion people, but if they don't have guns they're not a very powerful military. (They have those guns now). Russia is reportedly running low on arms, equipment and munitions and a strained economy to rebuild their piles with. They can keep sending soldiers to Ukraine and they have a lot of them to send, but if they're not properly trained they're going to keep dying Ultimately though the fate of the war depends on how long the West will keep supporting Ukraine. Russia might have a hard time finding enough arms but Ukraine would be completely bereft by now without the West. There's a risk to Ukraine that Europe's own economy will falter and they see the East as less important than keeping the lights on. And if pro-russian republicans take more seats in America then they could make it difficult for Biden to keep supplying aid.
I think the narrative has been that Russia has been reluctant to send troops / reserves from the well populated areas in the West of Russia (e.g. Moscow, St Petersburg etc) as it will be much more noticeable to the media when they don't return home. So the majority of troops have come from low-population areas in backwaters. So, they do have those troops in reserve allegedly. It's also been widely reported that Russian generals had vastly over-reported the number and readiness of both troops and material up the chain of command (much material and money lost to corruption). So battle plans were based on what they thought they had rather than what they actually had. I wouldn't be surprised if Russia's best case scenario is to hold Crimea and that's it.
If they lose Crimea there could be another war in ten, twenty years time. I don't think Russia will leave that be. I know Russia tried to claim NATO was their cassus belli, but I think the only hopes not to have a Ukraine war part II further down the line (if Ukraine wins) would be to immediately adopt them into NATO after hostilities cease. If Ukraine wins and doesn't join NATO its only a matter of time before Russia tries again. On the other hand. Russia might demand assurances they won't join NATO or EU before hostilities end.
like... once they are in the **** they are in the ****... theres nothing to say they won't pour in the big guns/whevers resources and smash back in and take what they want. in the end the bit of kharkiv they have lost was never in theory the part to be "liberated" officially. Thats still largely in thier hands though it looks in jepardy here unless the move fast, the goal was to sweep the south to moldova and take a section of that country. "officially" neither were nato nations so both were in putin's eyes fair game and if the rest fell... well and good. the issue with crimea is the same issue as the Germans had. its a very narrow land bridge so clearly the ukranians folded in feb or traitors went over to allow the forces through day 1. if Ukrainians get that far now the Russia will be there in force on a narrow front but resupply will be difficult as it'll go by sea across a short stretch for russia proper. Ukraine have the possibilty to loop round south to retake the nuclear plant, and head for the sea and pinch off the Kherson area from the donbas but.. this won't last for long as a chance imo. ukriane have issues to overcome. a) troop resupply b) troop fatigue c) campaign conditions IMO once winter hits the russians will be rebuilding ready to go next spring so some serious resupply form the west is needed over this winter.
Moldova has always worried me. The only reason Moldova is a separate state is because of Russian pressure. Moldova and Romania see themselves as one people and one nation. If Russia take Moldova that's going to piss Romania off and Romania ARE a NATO country. One hot-headed general from either side could trigger WWIII.
