Image is of container ships waiting outside the canal. While there is usually some number of ships waiting for passage, the number has increased significantly lately.

In order to move ships through the Panama Canal, water is needed to fill the locks. The water comes from freshwater lakes, which are replenished by rainfall. This rainfall hasn’t been coming, and Lake Gatun, the largest one, is at near record low levels.

Hundreds of ships are now in a maritime traffic jam, unable to cross the canal quickly. Panama is attempting to conserve water and have reduced the number of transits by 20% per day, among other measures. The Canal’s adminstrators have warned that these drought conditions will remain for at least 10 months.

It is unlikely that global supply chains will be catastrophically affected, at least this year. Costs may increase for consumers in the coming months, especially for Christmas, but by and large goods will continue to flow, around South America if need be. Nonetheless, projecting trends over the coming years and decades, you can imagine how this is yet another nudge by climate change towards dramatic economic, environmental, and political impacts on the world at large. It also might prompt discussions inside various governments about nearshoring, and the general vulnerability of global supply chains - especially as the United States tries, bafflingly, to go to war with China.

After some discussion in the last megathread about building knowledge of geopolitics, some of us thought it might be an interesting idea to have a Country of the Week - essentially, I/we choose a country and then people can come in here and chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants, related to that country. More detail in this comment.

Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Okay, look, I got a little carried away. Monday’s update usually covers the preceding Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, but I went ahead and did all of last week. If people like a more weekly structure then I might try that instead, if not, then I’ll go back to the Mon-Wed-Fri schedule.

Links and Stuff

The bulletins site is down.

Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists

Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict

Add to the above list if you can.

Resources For Understanding The War

Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.

Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.

Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.

Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.

On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.

Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.

Telegram Channels

Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.

Pro-Russian

https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.

https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.

https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.

https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.

https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.

https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.

https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.

https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.

https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.

https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.

Pro-Ukraine

Almost every Western media outlet.

https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.

https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.

Last week’s discussion post.

  • SimulatedLiberalism [none/use name]English
    49•2 years ago

    Russia has successfully launched Kinzhal hypersonic missiles from Su-34s, no longer requiring the use of MiG-31 platforms:

    Russia Launches First Ever Ballistic Missile Attack From Su-34 Strike Fighter: Kinzhal Provides New Capabilities

    The Russian Air Force has for the first time employed Su-34 strike fighters to launch ballistic missiles, which was a previously unknown capability that could transform the way the aircraft are used. This development follows a reported surge in production of the missile in question, the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal, which from late 2017 was integrated onto modified MiG-31 interceptors which were designated MiG-31K and, for later variants, MiG-31I. While only approximately 30-35 MiG-31K/Is are currently in service, however, the Su-34 is the most widely fielded fighter class in the Russian Air Force with over 120 having entered service. The discrepancy in numbers is further exacerbated by the fact that the Su-34 requires significantly less maintenance and has higher availability rates and lower operational costs than the MiG-31, which makes it an optimal aircraft to deploy Kinzhal missiles. The integration of the Kinzhal onto the Su-34 has significant implications across multiple theatres where the aircraft are deployed, from the Arctic and Far East to the Ukrainian and Syrian theatres. The Su-34 is the longest ranged tactical combat jet in service anywhere in the world, and second only to the MiG-31 for the position of the world’s largest. As a much more modern aircraft with a more efficient design it can carry much heavier payloads over longer distances.

    continued:

    Russian state media outlets notably mistakenly initially reported that it was the lighter Su-35 fighter which had been used to carry the Kinzhal missile, while also mislabelling pictures of the Su-34 as ‘Su-35.’ The Su-35’s design as an air superiority fighter, and its much lower carrying capacity and range and higher cost than the Su-34, raised questions from the outset regarding the plausibility of these reports. A defence official speaking anonymously reported on September 4 regarding the first Kinzhal missile strike from a Su-34: "The Su-34 fighter jet used the Kinzhal hypersonic missile in the special military operation. The first crew who successfully accomplished such a task will receive state awards.” Kinzhal missiles have been employed extensively in the Ukrainian theatre, with one of their most significant achievements being the reported destruction of newly delivered Patriot missile batteries in the Ukrainian capital Kiev in May when fired from MiG-31K strike fighters. The missiles are highly manoeuvrable and difficult to track, which combined with their terminal speeds approaching Mach 9 makes them very difficult to intercept. The can carry a variety of warhead types, and are produced on the same production lines as 9M723 missiles for the Iskander-M ground based system which have seen productive capacity increase manifold over the past year. The unique capabilities of Russian air launched cruise and ballistic missiles integrated onto its fighters had provided a key means of compensating for shortcomings elsewhere in its defence sector such as the serious delays faced in fielding stealth fighters when compared to rival Chinese and American programs.

    • WilsonWilson [comrade/them, he/him]English
      30•2 years ago

      Boris Rozhin claims RF is also starting to use glide bombs:

      The first successful combat use of the FAB-1500 with UPMK is reported. We are waiting for an increase in the production of UPMK for this type of bombs, which will be especially useful when breaking into enemy defenses in capital buildings.