>>22346167 Ukraine’s Zelensky offers firefighters to Los AngelesPN

And yet, the asshole wants to send Ukrainians to fight fire in CA. If they come they will loot and steal

13 Jan, 2025 14:33

Ukraine’s military weakened in 2024 – Global Firepower

The outlet has downgraded Kiev from 18th to 20th place in its latest rating of the world’s most powerful armies, with Moscow ranking second

Ukraine’s military has slid for a second consecutive year in the rating of the world’s top armies compiled by Global Firepower.By contrast, Russia has retained second place for over a decade.

In its 2025 Military Strength Ranking, the analytical outlet ranked the US military first, with a ‘PowerIndex’ score of 0.0744 (where 0.0000 is considered perfect), followed by Russia with 0.0788, and China in third place with the same score.Ukraine ranks 20th, with a score of 0.3755. The latter indicator inversely correlates with a nation’s military might.

Last year’s assessment placed Kiev in 18th place, with the top three armies remaining unchanged. In 2023, Ukraine ranked 15th.

The website, which has been publishing annual ratings of 145 armed forces since 2006, claims to base its analyses on “each nation’s potential war-making capability across land, sea, and airfought by conventional means,” – meaning that a country’s nuclear arsenal, if it has one, does not factor in. “The results incorporate values related to manpower, equipment, natural resources, finances, and geography represented by 60+ individual factors,” Global Firepower writes on its website.

Speaking in mid-December,Valery Gerasimov, the head of the Russian General Staff,estimatedthat since the Ukrainian conflict escalated in February 2022,Kiev had suffered nearly 1 million casualties in terms of manpowerand lost approximately 20,000 tanks and other armored vehicles.

According to the general, while the “US and its allies [had] significantly increased the volume of military assistance to Ukraine,” Russian forces continued to have the upper hand on the battlefield.

In an interview with local media late last month,Vladimir Shylov, former commander of the 3rd Company in Ukraine’s 134th Separate Territorial Defense Battalion, claimed that the country had “ceased to exist” as a functional state due to widespread corruption and mismanagement==, pointing the finger at the leadership in Kiev and Vladimir Zelensky personally.

He warned that in light of these difficulties,Kiev’s forces could soon be overwhelmed by advancing Russian troops, allowing Moscow’s military to reach as far as the Dnieper River.

The former commander alsocriticized Ukraine’s ongoing incursioninto Russia’s Kursk Region, describingit as a political ploy without any real strategic military value. He pointed out that the operation has failed to stop Moscow from making territorial gains in recent months.

Several Western media outlets have similarly quotedUkrainian officers and soldiers as complaining about dire manpower shortages, despite the ever-intensifying mobilization of fighting-age men.

https://www.rt.com/russia/610807-ukraine-military-weaker-rating/

13 Jan, 2025 18:43

Hundreds of athletes killed on the battlefield - Ukrainian sportswoman to RT

Ukrainian athletes have been tricked or forced en masse to enlist, Larisa Zhalinskaya says

The conflict between Moscow and Kiev has taken a heavy toll on the Ukrainian sports community, with hundreds of athletes ending up forced into the military and killed on the front lines, rower Larisa Zhalinskaya has told RT.

The athlete says she was forced to join the Ukrainian National Guard during the conflict. However, Zhalinskaya managed to flee Ukraine, leaving the country for Poland and ultimately travelling to Russia through Belarus.

“The goal was simply to save enough money to escape from Ukraine, and it was not an easy one, given that corruption was widespread in the [National Guard] unit I served with.I had to hand over roughly half of my allowance to the officers.

Today, many consider my actions escape, but I would call it a return to my homeland,” Zhalinskaya said. The athlete hails from Zaporozhye Region, which voted to join Russia in a late 2022 referendum.

Ukraine has gradually been militarizing its sports communityover the past decade, and funding for civilian athletics is constantly shrinking, Zhalinskaya said.

As an alternative, the athletes have been offered service with the Ukrainian military and the National Guard;they are told they won’t be involved in the fightingand can continue to do sports.

The military had insisted it did not require the athletes to demonstrate outstanding sports performance, with any results said to be acceptable, Zhalinskaya said. The situation, however, changed with the escalation of the conflict in February 2022.

“Many were sent to the front line, many of them have already died. Last fall, the Ukrainian side officially stated thatmore than 600 Ukrainian professional athletes and coaches have died,” she said.

Given that writing off unrecovered casualties as deserters or missing in action has become a common practice in the Ukrainian military, the figure is likely significantly higher than the official tally of 600, Zhalinskaya suggested.

“For comparison, 140 athletes represented Ukraine at the Olympic Games. Four Olympic teams have been herded to the frontline and killed,” she said, urging her colleagues to flee the country immediately if such an opportunity arises.

https://www.rt.com/russia/610799-ukrainian-athletes-military-service/

13 Jan, 2025 14:12

‘Let’s buy good, cheap gas from our friends in Russia’ – UK politician

David Kurten has called for reactivating the only undamaged Nord Stream gas pipeline amid low reserves and low temperatures

British Eurosceptic politician David Kurten has called for a partial relaunch of the Nord Stream pipeline system – which previously pumped Russian natural gas to the EU – amid freezing weather and supply fears.

In a statement on X on Sunday, the politician, who leads the Heritage Party, advocated purchasing gas from Russia to address a potential energy shortage.

“One of the four Nord Stream pipelines is undamaged and could be turned on again very quickly. Let's buy good, cheap gas from our friends in Russia once again,” Kurten wrote.

British gas supplier Centrica warned last week that “plunging temperatures… ==have reduced UK winter gas storage to concerningly low levels.”

“Stubbornly high” gas prices have made it “more difficult to top up storage,” the company added. The network operator National Gas has since downplayed the concerns, stating that the storage level “remains healthy.”

The Nord Stream 1 & 2 pipeline system, operated by Russia’s Gazprom, was designed to pump gas under the Baltic Sea directly to Germany. The first line was launched in 2011 and became a key energy source for the EU.

Nord Stream 2, completed in 2021, was intended to double the system’s capacity, but never went online due to certification issues in Germany – which were exacerbated by the escalation of the Russia-Ukraine conflict the following year.

Both Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 were ruptured in September 2022 in what EU officials described as an act of sabotage. Explosions rendered three of the four conduits inoperable.

Russia has repeatedly called for an impartial international investigation, while criticizing the transparency of European-led probes. Moscow has suggested that the United States may have been behind the explosions, in an attempt to reduce Russia’s energy leverage.

The Nord Stream shut-down has sent energy prices soaring in Germany, which previously bought over 50% of its natural gas from Russia, and forced it to buy more expensive LNG from other suppliers, including the US.

In 2023, the EU’s largest economy entered a recession, according to official statistics. Other countries, including Austria,

Italy, Hungary, and Slovakia, have also experienced disruptions, which have beenfurther exacerbated by the suspension of Russian gas transit via Ukraine, after Kiev refusedto extend a transit deal beyond 2024.

German opposition politician and candidate for chancellor Alice Weidel pledged last week to put Nord Stream back into operation if her party, Alternative for Germany (AfD), wins next month’s general election.

The UK, unlike many European nations, historically imported only a small percentage of its gas from Russia. Before 2022, Russian imports accounted for less than 4% of the UK’s total supply, trailing behind domestic production in the North Sea, and imports from Norway, Qatar, and the United States.

The Heritage Party was founded by Kurten in 2020. It claims to defend traditional family values and national sovereignty, while seeking to scale back UK ties with the European Union. In the UK's general election last July, it contested several constituencies but did not secure any seats in parliament.

https://www.rt.com/news/610813-uk-politician-nord-stream/

Nord Stream sabotage is coming back to bite the countries that backed it