The Eagle Has Crash-Landed

19 Responses to The Eagle Has Crash-Landed

1. C.L. says:

   21 March, 2023 at 1:09 am

   King Pyrrhus of Epirus seemed to be having a good war when he won the Battle of Asculum against Roman forces in 279BC. But the Greeks lost many men in the fight, and when the king was congratulated on his success he replied gloomily: “If we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined”.

   Pyrrhus is remembered for this alone: a victory that was really a defeat.

   The Battle of Azovstal was fought in the huge steelworks at Mariupol last April and May. The Ukrainian forces eventually lost. The Russians won, but at huge cost. The battle was Vladimir Putin’s pyrrhic victory, a military success but a moral and political disaster that will overshadow the rest of his brutal and unnecessary war.

   The siege of Azovstal is already enshrined in folklore as Ukraine’s Dunkirk, a battle ending in retreat that has nonetheless become a stirring symbol of heroism, defiance and resistance. In military terms, it was a significant reverse for Ukraine, the moment when Mariupol was finally overrun and Russia’s land bridge to Crimea secured. But historians will look back at the battle as the costliest victory of Putin’s war.

   By mid-April most of Mariupol had been destroyed by Russian shelling. Only the enormous Azovstal iron and steel works remained, as one witness put it, a “fortress within the city”. An icon of Soviet industrial productivity, the factory once churned out six million tonnes of steel a year and produced the metal to entomb radioactive Chernobyl. Surrounded by water on three sides, with a network of underground tunnels, workshops and 36 concrete nuclear bunkers some 6m below ground, Azovstal was the ideal setting for a gallant last stand.

   While Mariupol itself was being bombed back to mud and occupied by Russian forces, a force of regular Ukrainian marines, foreign volunteers and soldiers of the nationalist Azov Battalion holed up inside the steelworks, along with dozens of civilians, and refused to surrender. Putin ordered his troops to blockade the plant, “so not even a fly can escape”.

   The stand-off continued for 12 brutal weeks. Displaying near-suicidal bravery Ukrainian helicopter pilots flew repeated missions to resupply the defenders with weapons and medicine, and evacuate the wounded.

   Conditions inside the freezing, sunless, foetid bunkers became increasingly apocalyptic as food and water stocks dwindled. The Russians intensified their bombardment of the plant using thermobaric weapons. Amputations were carried out without sufficient anaesthetic. By the end, the defenders were down to one meal a day of tinned meat mashed with water. The civilians, including 14 famished children, were evacuated on April 30, but the Ukrainian soldiers clung on. Russian infantry repeatedly attempted to break through Azovstal’s perimeter and were repelled.

   A generator continued to provide power to maintain the internet and crucial contact with the outside world. Unlike other terrible sieges in history, this one could be followed in real time. As one of the besieged men observed: “It feels like I’ve landed in a hellish reality show in which us soldiers fight for our lives and the whole world watches this interesting episode. Pain, suffering, hunger, misery, tears, fears, death. It’s all real.”

   To the outside world, the defence of Azovstal became a desperate symbol of Ukrainians’ willingness to fight and die for their land, despite overwhelming odds. The story even penetrated popular culture. During the final of the Eurovision Song Contest, the frontman for the Ukrainian rap group Kalush Orchestra (which went on to win), shouted: “I ask all of you, please help Azovstal, right now!”

   Realistically, the defenders could not be helped. The helicopter relief flights flew in and out of Azovstal nearly 30 times and lost three aircraft. But even this lifeline became impossible and the plant was cut off. The Ukrainian presidency declared: “The enemy is trying to strangle the final resistance of the defenders of Mariupol in the Azovstal area”.

   Finally, on May 16, Ukraine’s supreme military command ordered the Azov Battalion and the other defenders to surrender. “Ukraine needs Ukrainian heroes alive,” President Volodymyr Zelensky declared in a televised address.

   Some 2500 Ukrainian fighters emerged from the ruined steel plant, before being loaded on to buses and taken into captivity (some were later swapped in a prisoner exchange). Russia’s defence ministry described the outcome as a Russian victory. History will not see it that way.

   The long siege prevented up to 17 Russian battle groups, some 12,000 troops, from redeploying to the battle further east in Donbas. It blunted the Russian assault and gave Ukrainian forces breathing space to build up defences for the next attacks.

   et more important than the tactical effect was Azovstal’s galvanising impact on the narrative of the war. It spurred resistance and demonstrated to the world, at a critical juncture, Ukraine’s determination to defend itself against Russian aggression. Like the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the utter destruction of Mariupol is an episode that will live in infamy, the defining crime of an unjust war.

   Russia dominated the battlefield in the end but Ukraine achieved an overwhelming triumph in world public opinion, snatching moral victory from the jaws of military defeat.

   Putin is already attempting to erase that memory. Moscow has announced plans to flatten what remains of the mighty steelworks and build a “technopark” over the site. But it is impossible to concrete over history. Like King Pyrrhus, Putin’s name will for ever be linked to a battle that he won and, in winning, lost.

   —————-

   Ben MacIntyre for The Times (in The Australian).
2. Petros says:

   21 March, 2023 at 3:18 am

   Delusional propaganda from an empire in its death throes. Vale Britannia.
3. Tel says:

   21 March, 2023 at 6:59 am

   The siege of Azovstal is already enshrined in folklore as Ukraine’s Dunkirk …

   Desparately trying to hold Bakhmut against massive artillery firepower is rapidly turning into their version of the ANZAC landing at Gallipoli.

   Russia dominated the battlefield in the end but Ukraine achieved an overwhelming triumph in world public opinion, snatching moral victory from the jaws of military defeat.

   It was General Patton who explained the value of dying for your country.

   The purpose of this proxy war is that the USA can bleed Russia, and weaken the economy of Europe … and it’s achieving that so, Patton’s rule is working for the Americans, for the time being at least. Pushing Russia and China into an alliance might not end up working so well in the long run.
4. Nix says:

   21 March, 2023 at 7:06 am

   As noted here before there is ample evidence that the Azov wasn’t composed of extremists. The fact CL persists with the assertion is proof he isn’t interested in avoiding the Putin propaganda view.
5. Nix says:

   21 March, 2023 at 7:16 am

   The Hague has collected plentiful evidence of war crimes committed in the course of Russian aggression, but it was the meeting between Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, the Russian ombudsman for children who was also included on the warrant, last month that pushed the urgency of addressing the thousands of Ukrainian children who are being subjected to “re-education” in Russian institutions (Rossiiskaya gazeta, February 16).
6. Tel says:

   21 March, 2023 at 7:44 am

   Crusader Nix, the evidence has been posted on this blog multiple times. If you want a long and detailed list, including photos, references to news articles and discussion of the relevant history leading to this … it’s easily available.

   https://www.conservapedia.com/Azov_Battalion

   In addition, the FBI has given evidence under oath that members of the Rise Above Movement (RAM) were travelling to Europe specifically to train with these people. If you prefer a leftwing source for these links, you can find it here.

   https://jacobin.com/2022/01/cia-neo-nazi-training-ukraine-russia-putin-biden-nato
7. MatrixTransform says:

   21 March, 2023 at 7:59 am

   Nix,

   you noisy clown
   all you is do talk

   the plural of ‘opinion’, is not ‘fact’
   no matter how many times you say it
8. Bruce of Newcastle says:

   21 March, 2023 at 8:23 am

   Our Nazis are nicer than their Nazis!

   It was the same in the Italo-Greek War with Mussolini’s fascists attacking Metaxas’ fascists. Metaxas was quite chummy with Germany. The Allies held their collective noses and backed the Greeks – which was so effective that Hitler had to bail Italy out. That delayed Barbarossa until late June. History may’ve been quite different if it had kicked off on 15 May as originally planned.
9. Franx says:

   21 March, 2023 at 8:43 am

   As with so much else that is being reported in the mainstream, there is very very little to be believed at first blush, and nothing thereafter.
10. C.L. says:

    21 March, 2023 at 10:25 am

    In 2019, 39 members of Congress signed a letter demanding Azov be officially declared a nazi terrorist organisation.

    I wonder why that never went anywhere. Mmm.

    The Azov men had been fantasising about a Glorious Showdown with Russia for years. They finally got what they wanted, were obliterated and ended up whining on Facebook to be rescued. Meanwhile, the knuckleheads of Ukraine’s “high command” avoided coming to terms for weeks to squeeze every drop of PR from the debacle – regardless of the cost to civilians.

    That’s what really happened.
11. Boambee John says:

    21 March, 2023 at 10:38 am

    Nix

    Lay off the Happy Baccy.
12. Bruce of Newcastle says:

    21 March, 2023 at 10:53 am

    In 2019, 39 members of Congress signed a letter demanding Azov be officially declared a nazi terrorist organisation.

    Congress wants to label Wagner group as a terrorist organization. Why is Biden opposed? (12 Mar)

    How about declaring both of them to be terrorist organizations? Works for me.
13. Crusader says:

    21 March, 2023 at 11:30 am

    Let’s wipe out all Ukrainians. It’s convenient. Then Putin will be happy and no other adjacent states need worry.
14. twostix says:

    21 March, 2023 at 11:43 am

    Let’s wipe out all Ukrainians. It’s convenient

    After ousting their elected president, Ukrainians were wiping out the majority ethnic Russians living in eastern Ukraine (AKA Russia) from 2014-2019 and you didn’t give a shit. Like good little germans they wanted the territory and not the residents.
15. NFA says:

    21 March, 2023 at 11:46 am

    Crusader, you and Nix are foul bots without a shred of humanity.

    And you use the tag, Crusader, which is so hurtful to the Muslim community let alone Nix using a Germanic folklore designation of an evil water sprite.

    Get a human life you pair of evil shites.
16. Crusader says:

    21 March, 2023 at 12:18 pm

    NFA; boo, hoo. Croc tears I expect. Poor Muslims. But not a word for innocent Ukrainians.
17. NFA says:

    21 March, 2023 at 1:02 pm

    Crusader says:
    21 March, 2023 at 12:18 pm

    NFA; boo, hoo. Croc tears I expect. Poor Muslims. But not a word for innocent Ukrainians.

    The innocent Ukrainians have left the country you evil moron.

    Things not working out for you in your fetid Socialist Alliance swamp and your posting rate fallen behind schedule you mindless drone?
18. Tel says:

    21 March, 2023 at 7:02 pm

    Let’s wipe out all Ukrainians. It’s convenient. Then Putin will be happy and no other adjacent states need worry.

    Ahhh yes, the pretend-to-be-sarcastic comment in response to a strawman that no one ever said in the first place. #TrollFarm all over again. I know, it saves time not bothering to read anything when you have so many other blogs to trash.

    Maybe if you tried driving a taxi instead … then being highly predictable would at least be useful to other drivers … worth considering, huh? Higher self-respect too.

    https://thecurrencylad.com/2023/02/22/churchill-reagan-and-jfk-would-have-agreed-with-every-word/comment-page-2/#comment-35811

    There’s your previous lame attempt … lift your game … or at least ask your supervisor for a fresh script.
19. Buccaneer says:

    21 March, 2023 at 7:57 pm

    Not smart enough to pass the exam to drive a taxi.