LaxPower Back-Up Stick

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.

Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!

Oh no! They must be stopped at all costs, Old Salt!! You can't convict people of breaking laws!!!

Should we defund the FBI, and stop this "making people follow laws" stuff that the FBI is doing????

And look, you're not gonna like hearing this, but I think I should tell you that "some guy on the internet" told me that Hunter was tricked by the FBI into leaving his laptop at that computer store. You heard it here first. Rumor has it that it was the same FBI agents who tricked Flynn.

And yes, Trump tricked you. And you also fell for his election fraud schtick. And his "I'll fix immigration" schtick.

All of Trump's greatest hits. You bought all of them. You have no one to blame but yourself.

Odd that you don't buy any of Biden's nonsense. It's a Xmas miracle!

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:53 pm**

a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.
Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!

For stuff they did before joining the Trump campaign or entrapped in process crimes manufactured by the FBI.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:00 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:53 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.
Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!
For stuff they did before joining the Trump campaign or entrapped in process crimes manufactured by the FBI.

LOL

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:20 pm**

Surprising effort from an insignificant country, with a GDP smaller than Italy's that's losing the war.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/01/worl ... nsive.html

Ukraine Fears New Offensive Is Underway as Russia Masses Troops

Russia is massing hundreds of thousands of troops and stepping up its bombardment, perhaps signaling the biggest assault since the start of the war.
“I think it has started,” Ukraine’s leader says.

Feb. 2, 2023,
KYIV, Ukraine — Moscow has massed hundreds of thousands of troops in Ukraine and is targeting dozens of places a day in a markedly stepped-up barrage of artillery attacks. Ukrainian forces are struggling to hold their ground on a 140-mile stretch in the east, awaiting tanks, armored vehicles and other weapons systems from the West.

Ukrainian officials have been bracing for weeks for a new Russian offensive that could rival the opening of the war. Now, they are warning that the campaign is underway, with the Kremlin seeking to reshape the battlefield and seize the momentum.

“I think it has started,” President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said this week.

Along the undulating front line in eastern Ukraine, artillery never goes silent for long. The roads in Ukrainian-held areas are largely empty, except for tanks and armored personnel carriers and huge trucks filled with boxes of ammunition. The few gas stations still operating are crowded with soldiers savoring hot coffee before returning to the fight.

Hospitals near the front lines are busy, but not overflowing. At one major triage hospital, there are long stretches of quiet and then, suddenly, a parade of ambulances arrives, filling the corridors with wounded soldiers in various stages of consciousness.

Fierce fighting is concentrated around the forlorn eastern city of Bakhmut, where Russian forces have been slowly closing in on vital supply lines. Before Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine almost a year ago, Bakhmut had a population of about 70,000 people. But most of those living in the battered city fled long ago, and on Tuesday night the mayor, Oleksiy Reva, pleaded with the roughly 6,500 who remained to evacuate.

Ukraine and Russia have been locked in grueling combat for nearly a year. Since the fall, when Ukraine reclaimed territory through counteroffensives in the northeast and south, the fight in the east has congealed into muddy and frozen trenches, each army facing significant losses while managing only negligible gains.

Both sides have been readying for heavier ground combat, with Moscow pressing its goal to capture the entire Donbas region of eastern Ukraine and Kyiv aiming to drive Russian troops out of the country completely.

The Russian approach shifted last month after the Kremlin named Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov to take over its struggling war effort. Since then, Moscow has steadily added forces in Donbas, seeking to do with overwhelming manpower what it has so far failed to do with firepower: break through lines that have been fortified for nine years, going back to when Russia first fomented rebellion in Ukraine’s east.

Ukrainian intelligence estimates that Russia now has more than 320,000 soldiers in the country — roughly twice the size of Moscow’s initial invasion force. Western officials and military analysts have said that Moscow also has 150,000 to 250,000 soldiers in reserve, either training or being positioned inside Russia to join the fight at any time.

“We see that they are preparing for more war, that they are mobilizing more soldiers, more than 200,000, and potentially even more than that,” NATO’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, told reporters during a visit to South Korea on Monday. “They are actively acquiring new weapons, more ammunition, ramping up their own production, but also acquiring more weapons from other authoritarian states like Iran and North Korea.”

The State of the War
A New Assault: Ukrainian officials have been bracing for weeks for a new Russian offensive. Now, they are warning that the campaign is underway, with the Kremlin seeking to reshape the battlefield and seize the momentum.
In the East: Russian forces are ratcheting up pressure on the beleaguered city of Bakhmut, pouring in waves of fighters to break Ukraine’s resistance in a bloody campaign aimed at securing Moscow’s first significant battlefield victory in months.
Mercenary Troops: Tens of thousands of Russian convicts have joined the Wagner Group to fight alongside the Kremlin’s decimated forces. Here is how they have fared.
Military Aid: After weeks of tense negotiations, Germany and the United States announced they would send battle tanks to Ukraine. But the tanks alone won’t help turn the tide, and Kyiv has started to press Western officials on advanced weapons like long-range missiles and fighter jets.
A surge in Russian bombardment has accompanied the buildup of forces.

Konrad Muzyka, a military analyst for Rochan Consulting, which tracks Russian deployments, said that reported Russian artillery barrages had risen from an average of about 60 per day four weeks ago to more than 90 per day last week. On one day alone, 111 Ukrainian locations were targeted.

He also said that “the Russians are withdrawing a lot of equipment from storage areas.” Still, he concurred with other analysts who say that Russia will struggle to outfit large numbers of new soldiers with tanks, armored vehicles and other effective equipment.

On Tuesday, Russian forces hit Ukrainian positions in Bakhmut with short-range artillery 197 times, and the two sides clashed some 42 times, Ukraine’s military said, significantly more than a month ago. Ukrainian forces beat back Russian soldiers, assaulting their lines time and again, the military said.

“They are just coming forward; they do not take cover, they are coming all-out,” Denys Yaroslavskyi, who commands a unit currently in Bakhmut, said on Ukrainian television this week.

Mr. Yaroslavskyi said “super qualified” soldiers from Russia’s military were now assisting fighters from the Wagner private military company, which has been sending waves of men into battle as cannon fodder for months, according to American and Ukrainian officials.

Andriy Yusov, who represents the intelligence department in Ukraine’s Defense Ministry, said the fighting would most likely intensify.

“We are on the eve of a very active phase,” he said in an appearance on national television. “Both February and March will be intensive.”

How the Kremlin will ultimately deploy its tens of thousands of new fighters is a matter of speculation.

Moscow could be preparing to open a new front, pushing across the Russian border to recapture territory in Sumy or Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine after being driven out months ago, according to Ukrainian officials and military analysts. It might be escalating fighting along the eastern front to divert Ukrainian resources and hurt Kyiv’s ability to launch its own offensive. It could be planning a drive from occupied territory in eastern Ukraine to push deeper into the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, which make up Donbas.

The only matter of consensus is that Russia is not satisfied with the territory it has taken and is maintaining its ultimate goal of subjugating Ukraine. The intensified assault has continued Russia’s pattern for nearly a year: bleeding the Ukrainian military through relentless attacks.

Oleksii Danilov, the head of Ukraine National Security and Defense Council, told Sky News on Tuesday that he did not rule out “any scenario in the next two or three weeks.”

“The main fights are yet to come,” he said.

Along with barreling down and trying to encircle Bakhmut, Russia in recent weeks has expanded its attacks to hit Ukrainian positions up and down the eastern front, according to the Ukrainian military and Russian military bloggers.

On the northern end of the front, where Russia halted the Ukrainian offensive around the city of Kreminna in the fall, Russian reinforcements now have the Ukrainians on the defensive. Russian and Ukrainian soldiers have posted graphic videos of fierce fighting in the forests close to the city, with the sound of automatic rifle fire and the thuds of mortars shaking the battered limbs of leafless trees.

Elsewhere in Donbas, the Russians have tried to push back into the city of Lyman, which Ukraine recaptured in October, in one of several recent moves that suggest Moscow may be laying the groundwork for a fresh offensive.

“It cannot be said that there was a large offensive operation, but the Russians are trying to take the initiative,” said Col. Sergei Cherevaty, the spokesman for Ukraine’s eastern military command, referring to Lyman.

On the southern edge of the Donetsk region in Donbas, Russia continues to assault the Ukrainian stronghold of Vuhledar, about 60 miles south of Bakhmut. The city is devoid of people but sits at the intersection of the eastern front in the Donetsk region and the southern front in the Zaporizhzhia region, a location that could prove advantageous for Russian forces trying to resupply troops moving between the two fronts.

Even as Russia launches assaults along the east, Ukraine continues to target Russian positions deep behind the front line. Ukrainian officials reported explosions on Wednesday around the Russian-occupied city of Mariupol.

After Russian forces besieged and conquered the southern port city in May, they gradually turned it into a major military garrison, according to Ukrainian officials. It is not in range of the missiles Ukraine currently possesses, but Kyiv has been able to strike deep into Russian-occupied territory in the past using drones and other means.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:27 pm**

When the Russians start breaking out mothballed T34s then you know it is going really bad for them. I bet they still have some Stalins organs floating around some place. Those katyusha rockets made a lotta German soldiers pee their pants. That was not because they were terribly effective, the incoming noise they made was terrifying.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:55 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:20 pm Surprising effort from an insignificant country, with a GDP smaller than Italy's that's losing the war.

And Saddam turned the world upside down, too. For over a decade. His GDP was even smaller than Putin's

How'd that work out for him? Or Iraq...it's taken them a couple of decades to recover. Gotta witty answer for that?

If you need me to explain how money works, let me know. You plainly don't understand that armies need money.

But please, keep trying to move the goalposts and pretend that I told you that Putin couldn't make a mess like a spoiled chid throwing a tantrum.

What I told you is that Putin can't act like the Soviet Union without the bankroll. And both you and Putin have had to learn that the hard way.

Or rather, Putin learned. You're still too arrogant to admit you've been wrong.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 4:11 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 1:57 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 1:37 pm Yeah. They were doing the deal for Trump Tower Moscow via that Alfa Bank secret server.
Glenn Simpson, Sid Blumenthal & the NYT told you all about it on their Collusion Tin Foil Hat channel.
Keep humping the Hunter sob story. Lay down that smoke screen before the House hearings.
I'm mocking YOU, and you know it.

You think that our Presidents can't get investigated. Been whining about this for over a half a decade, and don't have enough sense to come out of the rain.

Here's a history lesson for you, because you're pretending you don't know this happened.

Bush Administration had 16 criminal convictions

Clinton Admin. had one.

HW Bush had one

Reagan Admin. had 16 criminal convictions.

Nixon Admin. had 55 freaking criminal convictions

And you're on here telling us that the FBI and DoJ should have left them all alone , and never investigated their various corruptions. And if they DARED to investigate the Executive Branch for breaking laws? They're a Deep State, and THEY are the bad guys. You can't investigate the President in Old Salt's world!

You're too much of a child to admit that you let an idiot.....Trump....trick you into thinking that the FBI isn't allowed to go after Presidential Administrations, when every single Presidential Admin over the last 50+ years has been investigated for some shenanigans or another.

And then tell us how you think that it's 100% ok to go after Joe Biden, after screaming bloody murder because Mueller convicted felons who worked for Trump. You can't keep your childish logic straight long enough to understand that not a single poster here thinks that Hunter shouldn't get investigated.

There's only ONE genius here who thinks Hunter should be left alone....and that's YOU, dear boy.
Hunter has millions of supporters. He's a recovering addict. He just forgot to file some taxes. The IRS catches up with everyone.
Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.

And you wuz wrong. What did Bull Durham find?

https://www.salon.com/2022/10/19/legal- ... al-record/

He looks like Charlie Weaver.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 4:13 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:20 pm Surprising effort from an insignificant country, with a GDP smaller than Italy's that's losing the war.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/01/worl ... nsive.html

Ukraine Fears New Offensive Is Underway as Russia Masses Troops

Russia is massing hundreds of thousands of troops and stepping up its bombardment, perhaps signaling the biggest assault since the start of the war.
“I think it has started,” Ukraine’s leader says.

Feb. 2, 2023,
KYIV, Ukraine — Moscow has massed hundreds of thousands of troops in Ukraine and is targeting dozens of places a day in a markedly stepped-up barrage of artillery attacks. Ukrainian forces are struggling to hold their ground on a 140-mile stretch in the east, awaiting tanks, armored vehicles and other weapons systems from the West.

Ukrainian officials have been bracing for weeks for a new Russian offensive that could rival the opening of the war. Now, they are warning that the campaign is underway, with the Kremlin seeking to reshape the battlefield and seize the momentum.

“I think it has started,” President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said this week.

Along the undulating front line in eastern Ukraine, artillery never goes silent for long. The roads in Ukrainian-held areas are largely empty, except for tanks and armored personnel carriers and huge trucks filled with boxes of ammunition. The few gas stations still operating are crowded with soldiers savoring hot coffee before returning to the fight.

Hospitals near the front lines are busy, but not overflowing. At one major triage hospital, there are long stretches of quiet and then, suddenly, a parade of ambulances arrives, filling the corridors with wounded soldiers in various stages of consciousness.

Fierce fighting is concentrated around the forlorn eastern city of Bakhmut, where Russian forces have been slowly closing in on vital supply lines. Before Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine almost a year ago, Bakhmut had a population of about 70,000 people. But most of those living in the battered city fled long ago, and on Tuesday night the mayor, Oleksiy Reva, pleaded with the roughly 6,500 who remained to evacuate.

Ukraine and Russia have been locked in grueling combat for nearly a year. Since the fall, when Ukraine reclaimed territory through counteroffensives in the northeast and south, the fight in the east has congealed into muddy and frozen trenches, each army facing significant losses while managing only negligible gains.

Both sides have been readying for heavier ground combat, with Moscow pressing its goal to capture the entire Donbas region of eastern Ukraine and Kyiv aiming to drive Russian troops out of the country completely.

The Russian approach shifted last month after the Kremlin named Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov to take over its struggling war effort. Since then, Moscow has steadily added forces in Donbas, seeking to do with overwhelming manpower what it has so far failed to do with firepower: break through lines that have been fortified for nine years, going back to when Russia first fomented rebellion in Ukraine’s east.

Ukrainian intelligence estimates that Russia now has more than 320,000 soldiers in the country — roughly twice the size of Moscow’s initial invasion force. Western officials and military analysts have said that Moscow also has 150,000 to 250,000 soldiers in reserve, either training or being positioned inside Russia to join the fight at any time.

“We see that they are preparing for more war, that they are mobilizing more soldiers, more than 200,000, and potentially even more than that,” NATO’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, told reporters during a visit to South Korea on Monday. “They are actively acquiring new weapons, more ammunition, ramping up their own production, but also acquiring more weapons from other authoritarian states like Iran and North Korea.”

The State of the War
A New Assault: Ukrainian officials have been bracing for weeks for a new Russian offensive. Now, they are warning that the campaign is underway, with the Kremlin seeking to reshape the battlefield and seize the momentum.
In the East: Russian forces are ratcheting up pressure on the beleaguered city of Bakhmut, pouring in waves of fighters to break Ukraine’s resistance in a bloody campaign aimed at securing Moscow’s first significant battlefield victory in months.
Mercenary Troops: Tens of thousands of Russian convicts have joined the Wagner Group to fight alongside the Kremlin’s decimated forces. Here is how they have fared.
Military Aid: After weeks of tense negotiations, Germany and the United States announced they would send battle tanks to Ukraine. But the tanks alone won’t help turn the tide, and Kyiv has started to press Western officials on advanced weapons like long-range missiles and fighter jets.
A surge in Russian bombardment has accompanied the buildup of forces.

Konrad Muzyka, a military analyst for Rochan Consulting, which tracks Russian deployments, said that reported Russian artillery barrages had risen from an average of about 60 per day four weeks ago to more than 90 per day last week. On one day alone, 111 Ukrainian locations were targeted.

He also said that “the Russians are withdrawing a lot of equipment from storage areas.” Still, he concurred with other analysts who say that Russia will struggle to outfit large numbers of new soldiers with tanks, armored vehicles and other effective equipment.

On Tuesday, Russian forces hit Ukrainian positions in Bakhmut with short-range artillery 197 times, and the two sides clashed some 42 times, Ukraine’s military said, significantly more than a month ago. Ukrainian forces beat back Russian soldiers, assaulting their lines time and again, the military said.

“They are just coming forward; they do not take cover, they are coming all-out,” Denys Yaroslavskyi, who commands a unit currently in Bakhmut, said on Ukrainian television this week.

Mr. Yaroslavskyi said “super qualified” soldiers from Russia’s military were now assisting fighters from the Wagner private military company, which has been sending waves of men into battle as cannon fodder for months, according to American and Ukrainian officials.

Andriy Yusov, who represents the intelligence department in Ukraine’s Defense Ministry, said the fighting would most likely intensify.

“We are on the eve of a very active phase,” he said in an appearance on national television. “Both February and March will be intensive.”

How the Kremlin will ultimately deploy its tens of thousands of new fighters is a matter of speculation.

Moscow could be preparing to open a new front, pushing across the Russian border to recapture territory in Sumy or Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine after being driven out months ago, according to Ukrainian officials and military analysts. It might be escalating fighting along the eastern front to divert Ukrainian resources and hurt Kyiv’s ability to launch its own offensive. It could be planning a drive from occupied territory in eastern Ukraine to push deeper into the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, which make up Donbas.

The only matter of consensus is that Russia is not satisfied with the territory it has taken and is maintaining its ultimate goal of subjugating Ukraine. The intensified assault has continued Russia’s pattern for nearly a year: bleeding the Ukrainian military through relentless attacks.

Oleksii Danilov, the head of Ukraine National Security and Defense Council, told Sky News on Tuesday that he did not rule out “any scenario in the next two or three weeks.”

“The main fights are yet to come,” he said.

Along with barreling down and trying to encircle Bakhmut, Russia in recent weeks has expanded its attacks to hit Ukrainian positions up and down the eastern front, according to the Ukrainian military and Russian military bloggers.

On the northern end of the front, where Russia halted the Ukrainian offensive around the city of Kreminna in the fall, Russian reinforcements now have the Ukrainians on the defensive. Russian and Ukrainian soldiers have posted graphic videos of fierce fighting in the forests close to the city, with the sound of automatic rifle fire and the thuds of mortars shaking the battered limbs of leafless trees.

Elsewhere in Donbas, the Russians have tried to push back into the city of Lyman, which Ukraine recaptured in October, in one of several recent moves that suggest Moscow may be laying the groundwork for a fresh offensive.

“It cannot be said that there was a large offensive operation, but the Russians are trying to take the initiative,” said Col. Sergei Cherevaty, the spokesman for Ukraine’s eastern military command, referring to Lyman.

On the southern edge of the Donetsk region in Donbas, Russia continues to assault the Ukrainian stronghold of Vuhledar, about 60 miles south of Bakhmut. The city is devoid of people but sits at the intersection of the eastern front in the Donetsk region and the southern front in the Zaporizhzhia region, a location that could prove advantageous for Russian forces trying to resupply troops moving between the two fronts.

Even as Russia launches assaults along the east, Ukraine continues to target Russian positions deep behind the front line. Ukrainian officials reported explosions on Wednesday around the Russian-occupied city of Mariupol.

After Russian forces besieged and conquered the southern port city in May, they gradually turned it into a major military garrison, according to Ukrainian officials. It is not in range of the missiles Ukraine currently possesses, but Kyiv has been able to strike deep into Russian-occupied territory in the past using drones and other means.

Hopefully Ukraine throws in the towel so this could be over with.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 6:36 pm**

CU88 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:00 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:53 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.
Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!
For stuff they did before joining the Trump campaign or entrapped in process crimes manufactured by the FBI.
LOL

It's perfectly normal to hire criminals and have them pass information to Russian agents.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:20 pm**

MDlaxfan76 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 6:36 pm
CU88 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:00 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:53 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.
Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!
For stuff they did before joining the Trump campaign or entrapped in process crimes manufactured by the FBI.
LOL
It's perfectly normal to hire criminals and have them pass information to Russian agents.

It's better to hire Russian agents. That worked well for Hillary.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:30 pm**

a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:55 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:20 pm Surprising effort from an insignificant country, with a GDP smaller than Italy's that's losing the war.
If you need me to explain how money works, let me know. You plainly don't understand that armies need money.

What I told you is that Putin can't act like the Soviet Union without the bankroll. And both you and Putin have had to learn that the hard way.

Or rather, Putin learned. You're still too arrogant to admit you've been wrong.

https://carnegieendowment.org/politika/88639

Can Russia’s War Chest Withstand the New Oil Cap?
The Russian economy is hardly likely to collapse as a result of the decline in oil revenues. What the decline certainly will impact is Russia’s development and long-term investment in new projects. In a decade, the energy superpower status Russia had claimed will be firmly in the past.
After several months of debate and preparations, the United States and other G7 nations introduced a price cap on Russian crude oil on December 5. In the ten months since Russia invaded Ukraine, this is the first serious attempt by the West to slash Russia’s oil revenues, which remain Russia’s biggest cash cow.

Until now, most sanctions have targeted the financial sector and technology. The United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada banned imports of Russian oil and petrochemicals back in March, but they had in any case imported insignificant volumes. The EU, meanwhile, postponed the introduction of an oil embargo passed in June until December, and an embargo on petrochemicals until February.

The price cap is aimed at solving the difficult task of preventing the Kremlin from replenishing its war chest while avoiding sparking a surge in global oil prices by removing one of the biggest exporters from the market, since such a surge could cancel out any losses felt by Russia in terms of export volumes. But will it work?

Following the introduction of sanctions this spring, Russia mostly redirected its oil exports to China, India, and Turkey. It will likely do the same with the remaining 1.2 million barrels a day that had until recently been sent to Europe. The first question, therefore, is how Asian importers will react to the price cap: will they risk using non-Western transporters and insurers (since Western ones are forbidden from transporting and insuring cargos of Russian oil being sold at prices higher than the cap), and setting up alternative logistics chains with Russia?

India has already said it will continue to buy Russian oil, using non-Western companies to obtain those supplies, but the country’s capacity to refine deliveries from Russia is not unlimited. China and Turkey have not yet made their positions clear, but Turkish imports from Russia have grown significantly this year, and Turkey is likely to remain a hub for Russian oil.

Further growth in Chinese demand, however, is hampered by both the fallout from the COVID pandemic and Beijing’s focus on energy security and determination to diversify its suppliers. For this reason, it won’t be particularly fast or easy to divert Russian oil supplies from Europe to Asia.

Even the act of diverting supplies to Asia entails a significant reduction in Russian companies’ profit margins. It costs a lot more to transport oil to Asian markets than to Europe, and there is not much spare transport capacity, which pushes up the cost of freight, reducing the profit made by Russian companies, whatever the amount at which the price is capped.

The price cap also enables Asian buyers to obtain big discounts on Russian oil. China and India may not officially be enforcing the cap, but it’s hard to imagine that companies from those countries will not use it to barter the price down. Indeed, this is already happening: some shipments to China due to be loaded onto tankers in January were sold at $5–6 cheaper per barrel than usual.

The second question is how fiercely Russia will fight the price cap. Russian officials have repeatedly said they will not accept a price cap, and have threatened to stop working with anyone who abides by it, even if that means Russia having to reduce its oil production, thereby taking an economic hit.

Russia has also been making practical preparations in recent months, expanding its own fleet of tankers to meet its transport needs and establishing contact with the “shadow fleet” assembled many years ago to transport Iranian oil following the Western embargo on it. Russia is also creating its own insurance company and cultivating connections with insurers in developing countries.

So how much will the price cap initially be felt in Russia? In the second week of December, market prices for Russian Urals crude were in any case below the $60 cap, falling to $43.73 on December 7. At the same time, the introduction of the price cap prompted a spike in freight prices due to a lack of tankers prepared to take on the new risks of transporting Russian oil. If transport prices remain where they are, the revenue from selling Urals crude could drop to $40–45 a barrel.

In all likelihood, an informed assessment of the impact of the oil cap will not be possible for the next six months. There’s too much uncertainty on the market and over the workings of the price cap itself. In the first week following its introduction, shipments of Russian crude fell drastically: by 16 percent on December 6, or about half a million barrels a day, according to analysis by Kpler.

The situation will likely unfold in a similar way to that seen in March and April: with an initial shock and slump in export volumes—caused by the disappearance of some previous supply chains, a high degree of uncertainty, and glitches in how the oil cap mechanism functions—followed by a period of stabilization and even minor growth. At the beginning of 2023, therefore, we can expect to see a fall in both export volumes and production, but with the prospect for a bounce-back in both areas.

Ultimately, however, a fall in revenue for Russia appears inevitable. Following the introduction of the price cap, Russia’s Finance Ministry more than doubled its forecasted budget deficit from 0.9 percent to 2 percent of GDP. Next year, the ministry expects oil and gas revenues to fall by 23 percent, but that might be an optimistic forecast, since the Russian budget is based on oil prices of $62–70 per barrel.

Still, the Russian economy is hardly likely to collapse as a result of the decline in oil revenues. Most likely, the slump in 2023 will be comparable to that seen during the pandemic in 2020, and won’t be enough to force Russia to end its war against Ukraine.

Even if oil revenues decline drastically, the National Wealth Fund is big enough to finance Russia’s war for another year or eighteen months. What the decline certainly will impact is Russia’s development and long-term investment in new projects, both fossil fuels and green technology. In a decade, the energy superpower status Russia had claimed will be firmly in the past.

https://www.scmp.com/news/world/russia- ... e-invasion

Russia’s liquid gas revenue set to double thanks to Asian buyers, despite Ukraine invasion
Renewed deals with Asian companies could result in US$3.8 billion to US$4.5 billion in revenue for the Sakhalin 2 natural gas project’s shareholders this year
State-run top shareholder Gazprom stands to benefit from the boost as Russia ramps up its military spending almost a year after it sent troops into Ukraine

Russia’s Sakhalin 2 liquefied natural gas (LNG) project could generate twice the revenue this year than it did before Ukraine conflict thanks to long-term deals with Asian buyers and higher prices, according to analysts calculations.
State-run top shareholder Gazprom stands to benefit from the boost which comes as Russia ramps up its military spending almost a year since it sent troops into neighbouring Ukraine.
Moscow has already tapped its rainy day fund, boosted domestic borrowing and is considering raising taxes.
Shell quit Sakhalin 2 as one of the many Western firms which pulled out of Russia after Moscow launched what it dubbed its “special military operation”.
Renewed deals with Asian buyers could secure demand for 6.5 million tonnes of LNG annually from Sakhalin 2, according to contractual volume data from the GIIGNL international group of LNG importers and Reuters calculations.
That could result in between US$3.8 billion and US$4.5 billion in revenue for Sakhalin 2 shareholders this year, according to Masanori Odaka, a senior analyst on Rystad Energy’s gas and LNG team.

China turns on tap to Russian gas in Yangtze River Delta with pipeline extension
8 Dec 2022

The project could earn another US$7.45 billion this year if it achieves its output forecast and sells 4.9 million tonnes of LNG on the spot market, according to Alexei Kokin, chief analyst with Russia’s Otkritie brokerage.
The project was forecast to produce 11.4 million tonnes of LNG last year, a senior official from Russia’s Sakhalin region had said, but the final figure is yet to be released.
In 2021, Sakhalin 2’s revenue totalled US$5.7 billion and net profit was US$2 billion.

But Asia spot LNG prices jumped 42 per cent in 2022 to average US$38.80 per million British thermal units.
With spot prices in Asia estimated to be higher than long-term deals, marketing additional volumes could be challenging, said Rystad’s Odaka.
China’s Sakhalin LNG imports more than doubled in 2022 to 33 cargoes, Refinitiv Eikon data showed.
It was not immediately clear what would happen to 2.75 million tonnes of LNG previously taken annually by Taiwan’s Communist Party, whose contract ended last year.

After Shell’s departure, the Kremlin created a new entity to run Sakhalin 2, one of the top LNG plants globally.
Japanese shareholders Mitsui & Co and Mitsubishi Corp applied to retain their stakes. They hold a combined 22.5 per cent stake alongside Gazprom, which has a 50 per cent holding.
Shell’s 27.5 per cent stake is now held by Sakhalin Energy. Russia has yet to name a new shareholder which will replace Shell.
Sakhalin Energy, the managing company for Sakhalin 2, did not reply to a request for comment.
Last week, Osaka Gas became the latest Japanese company to renew its deal to buy 200,000 tonnes of LNG per year from the project – or about 2 per cent of the firm’s supply.
South Korea’s KOGAS continues to offtake LNG under its 10-year contract, its spokesman said, and Japanese Hiroshima Gas, JERA, Kyushu Electric, Saibu Gas, Toho Gas, Tohoku Electric and Tokyo Gas have also renewed their deals, companies have said.
While the Asian energy firms declined to provide specifics of their renewed agreements, they have said conditions were either similar or not much different from the previous deals.

https://www.ft.com/content/c10bcdb9-d01 ... 736e263a1e

Russian fertiliser export revenue surged 70% in 2022 as prices jumped
Volumes only fell by 10 per cent despite analysts’ predictions of a collapse in shipments after start of Ukraine war

Russia’s revenue from fertiliser exports soared last year despite a decline in sales volumes, as crop nutrient prices rose sharply after its invasion of Ukraine.

In the first 10 months of 2022, Russian fertiliser exports jumped 70 per cent to $16.7bn compared to the same period in 2021, according to UN data.

Import statistics from Moscow’s trade partners show that, in volume terms, overseas sales by the world’s largest fertiliser exporter only fell 10 per cent from the same period the previous year, analysis by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization found.

This is despite analysts’ predictions at the outbreak of the war in February that shipments would collapse.

Food and fertiliser exports from Russia are exempt from western sanctions in order to support food security, especially for poorer countries. Moscow has been increasing its exports to countries such as India, Turkey and Vietnam.

“Clearly countries like India have been the biggest beneficiaries [in terms of fertiliser imports],” said the FAO’s Josef Schmidhuber.

Russian and EU officials have been concerned that some buyers and their banks and insurers were self sanctioning and avoiding buying products from Russia.

The EU last month clarified the exemption from sanctions for Russian agriculture and fertiliser exports after claims among EU member states that shipments were sometimes being held up due to worries over possible involvement of sanctioned Russian companies or individuals.

The EU introduced new exemptions allowing individual EU member states to unfreeze money of sanctioned individuals who were involved in the Russian fertiliser and agricultural sectors.

International prices fertiliser prices began to surge even before the war as Russia curtailed supplies of natural gas, the main feedstock for nitrogen fertilisers. Prices for potash, another important fertiliser, jumped after western governments imposed sanctions on Belarus, one of the leading producers of the crop nutrient, after Minsk quashed anti-government protests.

The sharp rise in gas prices after the Russian invasion led to plant closures in Europe, which drove up prices of nitrogen fertilisers, which are crucial to output and quality of food production.

Grain shipments have also returned to prewar levels. The volume of grains, including wheat and corn, shipped during the past three months of 2022 was up 21 per cent from the same period the previous year, according to data from vessel trackers Sea/.

One commodity that has not seen a recovery in exports is ammonia, a feedstock for nitrogen fertilisers, due to the closure of a pipeline through Ukraine. Russia accounts for about 12 per cent of the global ammonia export market, and the FAO data shows that Russian exports of the chemical, which is also used in industries such as plastics and textiles, fell 76 per cent by volume in the first nine months of 2022 compared to the same period the previous year.

The Black Sea grain agreement between Moscow and Kyiv brokered by the UN and renewed in November included a pledge to restart Russian exports of ammonia by reopening of the pipeline. Russian fertiliser companies and investors, including sanctions-hit Russian fertiliser billionaire Dmitry Mazepin, have been calling for a resumption of shipments although the recent fall in international nitrogen fertiliser prices weakens the urgency, analysts said.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:37 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:20 pm
MDlaxfan76 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 6:36 pm
CU88 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:00 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:53 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.
Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!
For stuff they did before joining the Trump campaign or entrapped in process crimes manufactured by the FBI.
LOL
It's perfectly normal to hire criminals and have them pass information to Russian agents.
It's better to hire Russian agents. That worked well for Hillary.

That’s tombstone material.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:45 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:30 pm What the decline certainly will impact is Russia’s development and long-term investment in new projects, both fossil fuels and green technology. In a decade, the energy superpower status Russia had claimed will be firmly in the past.

You can't even pay attention to your own freaking citations.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:48 pm**

MDlaxfan76 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 6:36 pm
CU88 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:00 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:53 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.
Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!
For stuff they did before joining the Trump campaign or entrapped in process crimes manufactured by the FBI.
LOL
It's perfectly normal to hire criminals and have them pass information to Russian agents.

He's just flat out lying now. Anything to avoid being a grown up and conceding a simple point. Like water is wet. Or the sky is blue.

Old Salt wants to hold his breath and stomp his feet. Why won't Mommy buy him an ice cream cone, and tell him he's right, and we're wrong.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:51 pm**

a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:45 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:30 pm What the decline certainly will impact is Russia’s development and long-term investment in new projects, both fossil fuels and green technology. In a decade, the energy superpower status Russia had claimed will be firmly in the past.
You can't even pay attention to your own freaking citations.

The green economy was going to make that happen anyway.
Putin is acting now, while his energy is still in demand & he has leverage.
The rest of the world is not following the US & EU on this.
As soon as the shooting stops, the EUroburghers will be suckling on the Russian cheap energy teat again.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:01 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:51 pm
As soon as the shooting stops, the EUroburghers will be suckling on the Russian cheap energy teat again.

a. When is it you think the shooting is gonna stop? You're still thinking this is a months-long deal, not years-long, just like Putin. I think you're nuts to be so certain of that.

b. wanna put some money on the idea that the EU will to right back to Russia while Putin lives? The longer this drags, the more time the EU has to find new trading partners, new sources, and/or get used to prices.

c. oil ain't the only thing Russia needs from the EU. And this mess is far from over. If Russia gets more aggressive, that won't help him with EU relations long term.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:39 pm**

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:47 pm**

a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:01 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:51 pm
As soon as the shooting stops, the EUroburghers will be suckling on the Russian cheap energy teat again.
a. When is it you think the shooting is gonna stop? You're still thinking this is a months-long deal, not years-long, just like Putin. I think you're nuts to be so certain of that.

b. wanna put some money on the idea that the EU will to right back to Russia while Putin lives? The longer this drags, the more time the EU has to find new trading partners, new sources, and/or get used to prices.

c. oil ain't the only thing Russia needs from the EU. And this mess is far from over. If Russia gets more aggressive, that won't help him with EU relations long term.

You may have noticed, the rest of the world is still purchasing Russia's energy, grain, fertilizer, minerals & weapons exports.

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:51 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:20 pm
MDlaxfan76 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 6:36 pm
CU88 wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 3:00 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:53 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:24 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 2:04 pm Trump didn't trick me into anything. I pointed out what the FBI was doing, in real time, leak by leak.
Clutch my pearls!! The FBI investigated TrumpTeam....which led to five felony convictions!!
For stuff they did before joining the Trump campaign or entrapped in process crimes manufactured by the FBI.
LOL
It's perfectly normal to hire criminals and have them pass information to Russian agents.
It's better to hire Russian agents. That worked well for Hillary.

yeah, that's what she did...

Posted: **Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:52 pm**

old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:47 pm
a fan wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 8:01 pm
old salt wrote: ↑Thu Feb 02, 2023 7:51 pm
As soon as the shooting stops, the EUroburghers will be suckling on the Russian cheap energy teat again.
a. When is it you think the shooting is gonna stop? You're still thinking this is a months-long deal, not years-long, just like Putin. I think you're nuts to be so certain of that.

b. wanna put some money on the idea that the EU will to right back to Russia while Putin lives? The longer this drags, the more time the EU has to find new trading partners, new sources, and/or get used to prices.

c. oil ain't the only thing Russia needs from the EU. And this mess is far from over. If Russia gets more aggressive, that won't help him with EU relations long term.
You may have noticed, the rest of the world is still purchasing Russia's energy, grain, fertilizer, minerals & weapons exports.

For less and less, perhaps you hadn't noticed that...

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