Yes, you are right, I lazily referenced the guy the MSM is talking about, which is obviously dumb.
But you:
Because you, as usual, just want to be the “expert”, not actually present an impartial perspective. I know, I know, english is only one of 4 or 5 languanges you speak, blah, blah, etc. etc.
I had time to do my own (imagine that) googling, and this is the person I was referring to. Your “reference” was off target too, Mr. “Expert”.
That ^^ poor slob is just an old white dude, no arms dealer trade in the works for him. Note he was jailed in August 2021.
Its definitely common. Not necessarily genuine, but definitely common.
I don’t doubt that some arrangements were made and his movements controlled in order to ensure he left with the impression “What a great place! Friendly people…” etc.
Yeah, nothing groundbreaking, from what I’ve seen.
It should have been held at a private residence over a pile of hookers and blow. Get the guys in his circle to drop the veil a little and get loose.
Of course. Putin is a politician, a professional liar by trade, so I don’t know why anyone expected some secret revelation. Putin said only what he wanted us to know, nothing more, nothing less.
Except that they don’t…If they truly had enough of these missiles they would have leveled Ukraine. It’s clear they don’t care about the number of casualties, even on their own side.
False then is still false.
where the hell are you getting your “real” information? Deep inside Putin’s starfish?
What was he supposed to say during that highly orchestrated “interview?” That he was losing the war?
All the western intelligence agencies are monitoring the conflict closely and I am sure have a more accurate bead on the numbers than you. Did you miss the part where the report was from US intelligence?
Explain to me your qualifications to assess the situation again?
You have a total lack of reading comprehension. I don’t believe any politician from any country because, unlike you, I don’t like the taste of balls in my mouth.
He was escorted at all times by a bunch of FSB handlers and all communication with “random” people was scripted.
If that was Tucker’s cup of tea, that was definitely offered to him in Hotel Moskva where he was staying. The FSB are very good at finding out what a mark truly desires. If you’re deemed sufficiently important by the Russians, after checking in at the front desk a stunning woman (or a buff dude, they do their homework well) would start hitting on you before you’d reach the elevator. Of course, if you decide to take up on the offer, you have to accept the fact that a bleary eyed, chain smoking dude named Igor will be looking at your horizontal performance via inbuilt cameras cameras in the room.
I know for a fact that 'Murican government employees were briefed about this in advance.
Apparently, Tucker was paid really well (or was shown tapes from the hotel room) because the Russians decided for a full on humiliation mode (an actual photo btw) to show that he’s their bitch.
Through my own experience combined with a careful study of history and current events, it seems clear to me that totalitarian regimes are not generally efficient or effective on a wide scale. Their enemies seem to want to portray this appearance of efficient and monolithic control (and generally the dictators themselves don’t want to contradict this).
But that level of control requires a lot of people working towards it. And those people need to be enough of a true believer to support the regime while also being cynical enough to be willing to fabricate appearances, which is a rare combination indeed. An idealistic person would not be inclined to take part in this sort of fabrication because he truly believes that his cause is just and why should he lie about it. A cynical person would take part, but only so far as it serves his own personal interests.
Add to that, you need all of these cynical true believers that are facilitating this honeytrap facade to also be competent and hardworking. Where do you find these people?
I’m not saying that Putin isn’t a terribly evil man. But you seem to be giving him way too much credit for being able to pull off this level of control and deception.
I’m also not sure why you think a picture of Tucker Carlson in traditional Buryatan ceremonal clothing is some sort of smoking gun. Likewise to a picture of him talking to someone in a grocery store.
That is absolutely correct. They cannot build tanks or guns but they can throw money around for bribes/influence.
Pretty much this, I assume you’re familiar with the concept of vranye. Communism in the Eastern Blocv survived for 45 years on opportunism, cynicism and around 10% true believers in satellite states.
Aside from several entities that are responsible for long range missile production (those that haven’t been killed in the meantime) it seems that the only competent people in the regime are in the intelligence services. Pretty much the entire nomenklatura has a FSB background.
If they know how to do something, it’s to bribe/blackmail people and run influence ops, including honeytraps. Now because they’re spectacularly capable but because it seems that the collective West gave up on the Russian threat in the 1990ies and gave them a free pass for 25 years.
This was only a decade ago. And Air Force general and surprisingly knowledgeable prostitutes.
