Day 646
Аnglophiles and heroin merchants
Lots more dead Russians.
Many are killed by drones, meticulously, but most are blown to little bits, instantaneously, by long-range artillery strikes.
Much of the war news about Ukraine these days has become systematically misleading. The trends are more positive than many would think. One fact of progress is Z’s comprehension of the fact, finally, that it makes sense to build defense fortifications in areas that might be attacked next.
People who count wars talk about small wars, medium-sized wars, large wars and world wars. By those standards, we are somewhere in the middle, casualty-wise. It could get messier, though1.
The Economist tells us the mood in Kyiv is darker, and hyperlinks to a previous article.
Right, so postings to this site will be lightly muffled and sprinkled with the crumbs of Пісна плюшка з маком for the next few weeks, even though I don’t really like pastry, and indeed I suspect that requests for a nice Danish (cf. Krusty the Clown) will be poorly received. In London. That is.
One caveat: our medium-sized war is part of the world war that Russia kicked off in 2014 by annexing Crimea and invading eastern Ukraine, marking the the end of the international rules-based order that we found so comfy.
Thanks for your writing.
With respect, a video of some unfortunate boy being ‘blown to bits’, as you so sensitively put it, adds little or nothing to the narrative.
Just porn really.
Brits chuckle in disbelief when they are told that a Kyiv bakery sells pastries called 'Джонсонюк'. The guy is so unpopular over there.