They do look military.

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Total of 4 USN P-8 Poseidon flights on Feb 11th and 12th, in eastern Mediterranean where these incidents most likely occurred. Flights in order. https://t.co/EIFQHr5K6e pic.twitter.com/eJ5FYzi8XP

RivetJoint  (@SpeckleBelly64) February 16, 2022

Ukraine drills near Kharkiv, including the use of NLAWs and Javelins (1 of 3). pic.twitter.com/laOuFgriAL

Bashkarma  (@Karmabash) February 16, 2022

Ukraine drills near Kharkiv, including the use of NLAWs and Javelins (2 of 3). pic.twitter.com/WuF36MixEv

Bashkarma  (@Karmabash) February 16, 2022

Found this....couldn't of been that debilitating because everyone walked onto that blackhawk.

A U.S. official tells Reuters a service member assigned to the U.S. Embassy Kiev experienced a "non-injury medical condition" and was transported to the Polish border where a U.S. Army MEDEVAC helicopter transported the service member to a local medical facility.

Idrees Ali  (@idreesali114) February 16, 2022

Nobody wants to here what really happened in 2014. That's Russian disinformation cookoo talk

Ah yes. China. That oft-thought voice of calm reason.

They have everything they need to conduct a large scale operation in hours. Regardless of whether Putin intends to invade or not, you have to acknowledge how serious of a threat that is.


I'm not Putin, so I don't know if there will be an invasion. He's certainly expressed his concerns about Ukraine, along with the consequences if it keeps trending away from Russia. A bunch of external factors such as the Bejing relationship, POTUS, cash reserves, neutered GER/FRA, military overmatch make me personally believe that if Putin wants to take Ukraine, he'll never get a better opportunity than now.

Damn, that first tank is a smoker.

I'm confused. Do you not believe that heavy armor columns are standing by 15km from the border?

I'm all ears. Be sure to cite where you got your information and your background.

Yanukovych was democratically elected and was overthrown by a coup orchestrated by Victoria Nuland. That's a fact.

It doesn't excuse Russia's actions and current threats. But it is a fact

A bunch of F35's deploying from Hill and going to Germany.

Meh, the US has been deposing leaders, fomenting insurrections and fucking with foreign elections for a hundred years or more.  I'm not sure why that would surprise anybody.  Heck, isn't that what The Big Guy was doing?

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I don't know this guy, so not sure if credible, but:

Reiterating what others are saying with my own map. 2 of  3 units reported in Russian media to be moving back to home bases are actually now closer/close to the Ukrainian border. Here's their approximate home base locations. This isnt the withdrawal you were looking for. #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/3mQwlIqKjW

Jeffrey Edmonds  (@jeffaedmonds) February 16, 2022

Russia says troops in west of country to resume normal positions in 3-4 weeks -RTE https://t.co/V4HdXAgOB5

EndGameWW3  (@EndGameWW3) February 16, 2022

@58teauge

any updated armor info available for us pleebs? I only know of a few twitters to look at

100%, I've been saying all along, Russia is planning military action.   But every now and then you have to laugh.  

I'm hoping things kick off soon, I'm not pro-war but I really believe the only way to solve the Putin problem is to hit him really hard otherwise he will keep harassing the world and funding thugs.

Who is going to hit him hard? Ukraine will pit up a fight and it will be a bloody mess, but Ukraine isn't stopping them. If it does actually pop off and Russia decides to go for Kiev, they will take it. There will be tens of thousands dead. I think Ukraine will put up a good fight, but they are just overmatched here. Russia is then going to "control" Ukraine, and have to deal with Urban insurgencies. The cost of that is probably too high for Putin and Russia, but who the fuck knows. The most likely and logical scenario is taking chunks of land in Eastern Ukraine. That would still be a disaster for all involved.

Most of the OSINT stuff on Twitter is still showing tanks driving through the street TOWARD the Ukrainian border, although there's a couple videos showing tanks potentially headed back into Russia on railcars.  Overall, MORE buildup on the border than not.

Video of T-80 tanks driving away from the train station in Tamarovka, Belgorod region 26km from Ukraine, and then turning and heading west in the direction of the border.

Video taken from here 50°40'25"N 36°14'13"E · pic.twitter.com/FijM1UfjHX

ELINT News  (@ELINTNews) February 16, 2022

Take with a big grain of salt, but here's an early sign of actual Russian military withdrawal.

Echelon containing T-80U tanks, MT-LBs and BMP-2s (4th GTD) went north, away from the border with Ukraine through Chernyanka in the Belgorod Oblast. pic.twitter.com/MilYuEMcS7

Status-6  (@Archer83Able) February 16, 2022

This map, although slow by a few days, shows about half of what's been geolocated. Click on the pins closest to the border(especially on the NE/N side) and see what's rolling through.

Too lazy to type anything up on troop dispositions right now because that could all change in 24 hours.


EDIT: One more thing, all of the training grounds that had equipment stored for months? Places like Pogonovo, Yelnya, Soloti....Those have all been emptied this week, going towards Ukraine.

Jan. 19 vs. Feb. 13

Russia should by all measure be able to roll right over Ukraine, but I don't have all that much confidence in Russian troops.  I think they will take some serious casualties, but either way, Putin's future will be over.  The international community will come down hard and Russia will have to get rid of him if they want to keep their economy moving.  Just my opinion.

Russian propaganda is spinning up too:

#Russia's RIA reports that the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation is launching an investigation into mass graves found in Donbas. https://t.co/gcL1AUKRQy

Doge  (@IntelDoge) February 16, 2022

So, we have forces massing near the border continuously (with some possibly re-shuffling, which could be a bid to throw off the OSINT folks), yesterday's cyber attacks, and atrocity propaganda spinning up about Donbas....this looks like war getting ready to start.  (Admittedly, maybe Russia just WANTS us to think that).

Germany is going to lead a coalition of the willing

There are very few ways this can play out where Russia loses. If I know Putin's actual motives I could make a more accurate assessment for win/loss but there are a few main points.

Putin clearly has some  kind of goal, if it's primarily take and hold all of Ukraine, well, that may or may not happen and it will be dependent on ow much stomach the west actually has to see that Russia doesn't take all of Ukraine.

Putin has already won on the front of strength and relevancy, there's been a lot of bluster from the west, some arms fortification but nothing put up that says it will be able to stop an invasion from happening, maybe make it costly for Russia but Putin has shown so far that Russia can do what Russia wants to do.

If Putin is after water for Crimea, he may get that without taking any more land, in which case he wins

Russia may gain more control over enough of eastern Ukraine to secure the water for Crimea, also a win.

If Russia invades and gains on those two goals even if they are contingencies of a ceasefire, then Russia wins.

If Russia invades and NATO goes all in and fails to push Russia back, then Russia wins. If NATO opts for a "limited response" Russia wins by making the west look weak.

I'm sure China is watching all of this with amusement, the weaker the west looks the closer they are to gaining hegemony. So any way that Russia wins, China also wins.

If it starts to look like it's really going to get out of hand and China steps in to  mediate, then both Russia and China win.

One of the things I'm expecting to see is a push from Biden to force Ukraine to give up land and water for Crimea in exchange for not invading. This will be claimed as a "victory" by the Biden admin by avoiding war, but it's really still a win for Russia.

Then the intensity of the conflict grows.

Another updating map source for those interested.

https://liveuamap.com/en/2022/16-february-forte12-is-paying-a-lot-of-attention-to-the-border

Substitute Hitler with Putin, Mel Brooks a little piece

ty!

More from this spot.https://t.co/RtRKscNuBI

Michael Sheldon  (@Michael1Sheldon) February 16, 2022

Feb 16 (Reuters) - Russia is continuing to move troops to the Ukrainian border and is likely to launch a "limited" military attack against the country, the head of the Estonian Foreign Intelligence Service said on Wednesday.

Idrees Ali  (@idreesali114) February 16, 2022

LoL

re: new bridge

This bridge is significant as it cuts the distance that units based near the town of Yampol need to travel to reach Ukraine down by over 70km & takes they through much less populated areas.
Only 800m of road is needed before the bridge connects to the existing road network. https://t.co/NUdN93Qpvw pic.twitter.com/HLbk4ZccP8

Nathan Ruser  (@Nrg8000) February 16, 2022

LOL! Not exactly.

Yanukovych was the "communist lite" Party of Regions candidate which was directly funded by the Kremlin in an orchestrated and corrupt election - The Communist Party of Ukraine (also Kremlin supported) also backed Yanukovych. Paul Manafort was his campaign manager (through his consulting firm) and was paid to get him in on behalf of the Kremlin. When Yanukovych took office, he instituted the takeover for Putin which included (but not limited to): changing school curriculum to reflect Russian history and erase parts of Ukrainian history, changing the national language from Ukrainian to Russian and Ukrainian, cut all military modernization cooperation projects with the USA, etc. and what sparked the revolution to oust the Russian agent Yanukovych was when he stated that Russian troops would occupy several Ukrainian military bases for "cooperation" purposes. At the about same time, Manafort, acting as Trump's campaign manager, attended the Republican National Convention in Cleveland and he and his team stunned the Republican committee when they opened up a meeting calling for the Republican Party's stance on arming Ukraine with lethal high-tech weapons to change from favorable to unfavorable. After Yanukovych was ousted, yes Nuland and company did butt in and manipulate Ukrainian politics (and I did not like that at all), but this is not what caused the ouster of Yanukovych. Afterwards, hundreds of Kremlin-bought Ukrainian agents in the government were thrown out and prosecuted and the Ukrainian Communist Party was disbanded, BUT the Party of Regions still exists - NOTE: former Ukrainian Poroshenko, the Ukrainian billionaire, is now under indictment for high crimes due to dealing behind the scenes with Russia on energy issues. Poroshenko was a founder of the Party of Regions (whose founding purpose was to break Ukraine up into more autonomous oblasts/fracture the country hence the name "Regions").

Parts of Donetsk and Luhansk obalsts (in the Donbass area) were taken over with Russian military help and Kremlin strategy NOT by a bunch of freedom-loving micro ethnicities. Millions fled those areas - if they were so freedom loving with Ukraine's government being "so oppressive" , then millions would have flocked there, didn't happen. The Russian Communist Party is the largest backer of these fake "republics" (just look at their vote from yesterday) and communists from many countries went there to fight for them BECAUSE THEY ARE COMMUNIST. Funny how there was no discontent in any other oblast in the middle of the country or anywhere else.

I know, I worked in the defense industry at the time and was working with them before this went down (been to the embassy more than a couple of times). I'm half Ukrainian, speak the language, and have studied Ukrainian history since the 1970s.