Russia - threadbanned users in OP

But it's the truth, nothing was lost. They know exactly where every piece of equipment is!!! It's now in Ukrainian hands.

Simply reposting Russian propaganda without contextualizing it is not helpful.

What gets no traction here is the ‘fact’ IMO that Russia has to be constantly at war with someone to show to its population that the motherland is under threat and therefor , I Mr Putin will react to protect you. And because of the desire of the continual Russian leadership to be the most powerful state in the world it try’s to achieve this in two ways ie

(1) have a powerful army and backed up by nukes in case the army ‘ wants to take a bit of a break’

(2) interfere in the business of other states to weaken them, sow division, create mistrust, interfere in election processes, steal information, etc,etc ,etc ,

"Russian missiles can outrange the Ukrainians and can be launched from deep inside Russia/Belarus without issue and to great effect.

Granted the stocks are limited but they are using them effectively."

Not sure I agree that targeting civilian infrastructure can be described as great effect. Having to get water from tanked supplies, heating from solid fuels, light from candles and battery powered lights and emergency generators running at essential services sites may be uncomfortable for Ukraine but is it going to be effective in helping russia win anything?

I saw an article that claimed the missiles fired after the last major attack Ukraine made on the russian navy boats cost russia about $750,000,000 and although they may have caused damage it looks like russia has depleted its stocks and increasingly using these is being met with an improved air defense in Ukraine so less and less of their investment in destructive missiles and drones is doing anything for them.

To all the peaceniks who came in here and spouted that Ukraine can never win, that they should surrender their land and their people to the Russians for the sake of peace. That the people in these regions wanted to be part of Russia anyway....

A big F***k you to you all....

Totally bizarre alright. You would expect a referendum to be held on secession several years after the place had been occupied, not bang in the middle of the battle to try and secure the place (!)

Ironically, I think this does serious damage to the idea that Crimea is 'Russian'. Putin has just hammered home the point that his referendums are an utter sham and not worth the paper they are written on.

In fairness yes, a "crowd-let" at best. It was the best picture I could find from the feed.

The report mentioned a crowd which might have been building when that photo was taken.

(Edit: Ah, I see a new video posted above. It looks like a decent crowd did turn up there. Fair play)

For me the refs were nothing more than another nuke threat... They meant nothing.

It appears the retreat went about as well as Russia could expect. I'm sure there's a few hundred of them in civilian clothes but this talk of 40k retreating and 20k getting stuck was bollix. Some as the 5k Russians stuck in Izyum and Lyman rumours.

I'm sure a month ago there might have been 40k Russians including collaborators but they started withdrawing weeks ago. Regardless I think the outcome was for the best. Humiliating blow to their best soldiers and the city retaken without much loses or another Mariupol.

Wraps up a nice few months of counter attacks before the winter.

Professor Clarke was saying on Sky News that the Russians, as well as leaving soldiers behind in civvies, left camera crews also to film whatever propaganda they're going to try and spin out of it.

@Rawr But all of this leaves me wondering; What got the Russian commanders to finally pull the plug on this? I'm pretty certain that Russian thinking until pretty recently was to have Kherson as part of their new Russian oblasts (why bother with a sham Referendum otherwise?). They mightn't get all of Ukraine, but at least maybe they could have this bastion on the south coast. But now they are leaving wholesale and I can't help but wonder what factor has made this come to pass.

The question is, what did they have to gain by staying there? Apparently they were engaged in a battle of attrition which the Ukrainians were winning and if they had stayed they'd be whittled away to nothing. From the videos I've seen of how many vehicles the Ukrainians have taken from the Russians, it seems it was only a matter of time for the Russians.