Sunday Thoughts December 03, 2023

At the start of the year my prediction with the Ukraine war was that it would not change a whole lot in 2023 but that things would come to a head in 2024. I think I said the autumn of 2024 we would see the Ukraine army start to break and bring with it political instability. Like all such predictions, it was based on nothing more than current trends. The Russians were in no hurry to launch a big offensive and the Ukrainians were bogged down in planning their offensive.

As is usually the case, that prediction is turning out to be wrong. Things are getting very weird in Ukraine militarily and politically. First there is this public dispute between the commander of Ukrainian armed forces Zaluzhnyi and the dictator of Ukraine Zelensky. Then you have members of Budanov’s entourage, including his wife, coming down with heavy metal poisoning. Both Zelensky and Zaluzhnyi are openly talking about eliminating the other from the scene.

Then last week Zelensky did a tour of the battlefields, meeting with all of the generals, except for Zaluzhnyi, who was off somewhere else. Then we get word that the Ukraine army is in retreat along the middle of the front. Some say it is to assume more defensible positions while others say it is to minimize losses and reduce the chances of the army revolting against Zelensky. In some of these places, the Ukraine army has been decimated over the last few months.

The topper is the Seymour Hersh story about secret negotiations being done by Zaluzhnyi and Russian chief of the general staff Gerasimov. It is a nonsense story, but clearly planted by people in Washington for some reason. It suggests there is something going on behind the curtain in Washington and that may be tied to the events in Ukraine. Instead of things coming to a head in late 2024 they may be about to go nuts to kick off the new year. 2024 is going to be wild.

Topics

* Seymour Substack (Link)

* Foreign Summary (Link)

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