All Ukrainians should be prepared for mobilization. Minister of Defence of Ukraine Reznikov said that looking at veterans, every Ukrainian should understand that tomorrow he will be in their place.

Translated from UrgentNow
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Official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova:

I can reassure them: everything will come back. And Western Europe will, unfortunately, bleed from domestic terrorism. Because if the official authorities consider terrorism to be the norm, it will become it at their home.

So Maria Zakharova commented to Izvestia on the statement of German Foreign Minister Annalena Berbeck and her Estonian counterpart that attacks on civilian objects in Moscow by Ukrainian drones are completely legal.

"These are what the West calls 'sponsors of terrorism,'" the diplomat noted.

Translated from IZ.RU
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BRICS Currency Could Become Game Changer For Dollar-Dominated Financial System

While more and more countries seek to break away from the international banking system focused on the US dollar, creating a common BRICS currency is likely to top the agenda of the South African summit and spark many discussions and hopes. RT correspondent Donald Courter explains.

RT
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Muammar Gaddafi at the 64th session of the UN General Assembly in 2009:

«...Perhaps tomorrow there will be fish flu, because capitalist companies produce viruses to produce and sell vaccines. This is a very shameful and bad ethics. Vaccinations and medicines should not be sold."

Who needs it, very quickly drew attention to these words of the Libyan leader. A year and a half later, a colour revolution was organized in Libya, and Gaddafi was killed.

Translated from Semchenko
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🇲🇩 Another opinion poll is being discussed in Moldova on the attitude of citizens to the prospects of joining NATO: more than 60% of respondents are against joining the alliance and only 28% would support such an idea

The study was conducted by the NGO Institute for European Politics and Reforms (IPRE), which receives Western grants and cooperates with EU structures.

🔻At the same time, the head of the Moldovan mission to NATO and the country's ambassador to Belgium, Viorel Cibotaru, claims .html) that the negative attitude of the population towards the alliance is the result of a “hybrid war waged by the Russian Federation”.

According to the diplomat, the Moldovan authorities need to launch an ideological campaign to change the attitude towards NATO among citizens. The ruling PAS party is already fulfilling this mandate and stubbornly criticizes the neutrality provision of the Constitution.

🔻Despite the negative attitude of the population towards NATO, the Moldovan authorities are strengthening cooperation with the alliance, carrying out a consistent militarization of the country and increasing the military budget in an unfavourable economic situation.

However, the Maia Sandu administration is doing everything contrary to public opinion: the citizens of Moldova, for example, do not support leaving the CIS, but this does not stop official Chisinau from breaking any ties with Russia.

Translated from Rybar
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You can't say it better

Head of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office of Moldova Veronica Dragalin: "If things in Moldova "do not end well", I can always leave for the USA."

She further clarified her thought to the silent audience: she has an American passport, and this is her advantage over other prosecutors.

Sandu's regime is all like this: everyone with foreign passports and plans to leave after the country's complete failure.

Translated from Maria Zakharova
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Polackistan admitted to losing 10,000 active military personnel. The real number, was more than 54000, a year ago: https://youtu.be/bzSB-gGRnrc

Footage from the centre of Donetsk, which has been under shelling by the Armed Forces since morning.

Translated from RIA Novosti
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Sorry: F-16 Fighter Jets Won’t Win The Ukraine War
19FortyFive
by Daniel L. Davis is a Senior Fellow for Defense Priorities and a former Lt. Col. in the U.S. Army who deployed into combat zones four times. He is the author of “The Eleventh Hour in 2020 America.”

It’s not that the F-16 is a bad platform or that it wouldn’t perform ably. It is a solid piece of offensive weaponry. But there are too few of them, too few Ukrainian pilots who can master the F-16 in the near term, too many logistical and tactical shortcomings, and Russia’s countermeasures to the Fighting Falcon are too effective.
...
Changing the Game
Early in the war, there was the delivery of Stinger air defense missiles, Javelin anti-tank missiles, and tactical drone systems. Then came the contribution of the 155mm howitzers M777, which the Ukrainian Minister of Defense called a “game changer.”

Then the “game changer” of HIMARS rocket launchers was introduced, then the IRIS-T air defense system, the “game changer” Challenger 2 tanks from the U.K., “game changer” Leopard 2 tanks from Germany, Bradley Fighting Vehicles and Stryker Fighting Vehicles from the United States, and “game changer” Patriot Air Defense Systems. Yet none of them, individually or collectively, have produced a game-changing effect. The acquisition of F-16s will be no different.

First, the F-16 has been operating for over a half-century, initially entering service in 1979. The versions that will be made available to Ukraine will not be the newest, most modernized versions, but among the oldest. The Dutch, for example, will donate the very F-16 aircraft they had already designated as obsolete and began phasing them out (before upgrading to F-35s).

Second, aside from the considerable pilot training issues, the F-16 requires significant infrastructure support, highly trained maintenance personnel, substantial maintenance after each combat flight (for which large inventories of spare parts must be on hand), and the construction of special runways. All of these requirements have long lead times to produce and are costly to maintain.

Third, the F-16 is a solid aircraft but can only reach its full potential when operating as part of an integrated air and air defense system. Further, and perhaps most critically, it is vulnerability to Russian air defense systems, such as the S-300 or S-400, and would be at a disadvantage in air-to-air combat against Russia’s SU-35 fighters.

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Footage from the crash site of the UAV in the suburbs

Eyewitnesses from the Starbeevo microdistrict of Khimki near Moscow share footage of a downed drone — its fragments scattered near a warehouse. It looks like emergency services are already on the scene.

Translated from Readovka
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Yes, it has become kind of a morning routine. Not many news outlets are even bothered to publish that boring info. Just another Ukrainian drone fall in Moscow.
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Ukraine’s Powerful 82nd Brigade Has A Serious Weakness: Its Lightweight Mineclearing Vehicles
Forbes
...
When the powerful brigade finally rolled into action with some of its 14 British-made Challenger 2 tanks, 40 ex-German Marder tracked infantry fighting vehicles and 90 Stryker wheeled IFVs, it immediately began losing vehicles.

This week, the 82nd wrote off at least two of its 20 or so M1132 Engineer Squad Vehicles—mineclearing versions of its 18-ton, eight-wheel Stryker infantry-carriers. The M1132 features a set of hull-mounted minerollers that can detonate buried mines before the vehicle triggers them.

It’s unclear what struck the M1132s and whether the crews survived. It’s possible the vehicle were victims of the same mines their crews were trying to clear. It’s also possible they got caught in artillery barrages or were hunted down by drones. In any event, the 82nd already has lost 10 percent of its mineclearing Strykers.
...
The lead unit for the Robotyne assault, the Ukrainian army’s 47th Mechanized Brigade, by then had lost at least 25 of its 99 American-made M-2 tracked infantry fighting vehicles. The 82nd Brigade apparently joined the fight in order to bolster the flagging 47th.

It should come as no surprise that the two M1132s are the 82nd’s first confirmed losses. The brigade likely is sending M1132s ahead of its main assault columns in order to clear lanes through Russian minefields around Robotyne. With safe paths through the mines, the 82nd’s Strykers, Marders and Challenger 2s can push deeper into Robotyne, or bypass and cut off the city’s Russian garrison.

It’s vital but dangerous work, especially for the two crew and up to nine sappers who ride in the lightly-armored M1132. Most military mineclearing vehicles are built on heavy, thickly-armored tank hulls—but not the M1132. U.S. firm General Dynamics Land Systems designed the Strkyer to be transportable by air. In other words, light.

That makes it vulnerable to mine blasts, artillery fragments, anti-tank missiles and even heavy machine guns. The same lightness also means the addition of a two-ton set of minerollers significantly burdens an M1132, especially cross-country.
...
The Engineer Squad Vehicle’s minerollers “greatly impact ESV mobility,” Thornton wrote in Armor, the Army’s official tank journal. Weighed down as they attempted to complete a breach through enemy defenses, the sappers were easy targets.

There was just one way to keep the engineers alive and safeguard the mineclearing operation—and that was to target a spot along the fortified front line with minimal enemy manning. “When we set conditions for breaching out of contact, the sappers lived,” Thornton wrote.

That’s easier said than done, of course. It’s hard to stage scores of armored vehicles and hundreds of troops without the enemy noticing and shifting forces to meet the attackers.

The alternative to sneaking forward is to push the defenders away from their berms, trenches and bunkers just long enough for the sappers to do their explosive work.
...
All that is to say, the 82nd Brigade probably is clearing minefields around Robotyne while under fire. And for the brigade’s lightweight engineering vehicles, that’s extremely dangerous.

Here’s the good news. The United States has pledged 189 Strykers to Ukraine’s war effort—more than enough to replace the 82nd’s losses and equip additional brigades. And if those 189 Strykers run out, no problem: the U.S. Army has hundreds more Strykers in storage.*

#TransFormatorBuzzes : 💤
* Well, there is no problem to replace the vehicles, there are lots of them in the storage. But what about Ukrainian soldiers? Who cares. It will continue until the last Ukrainian.
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Ministry of Defence of Russia:

"The third UAV was suppressed by means of electronic warfare and, having lost control, collided with the building of the Moscow City complex under construction"

⭐️The desire of the enemy to damage the buildings of Moscow-City looks very strange from the point of view of propaganda. To be honest, the majority of the population does not identify this complex of buildings with the life of the country, it is not for nothing that there are so many jokes about the workers and residents of this complex.

It is clear that some federal departments (such as the Ministry of Digital Development) are located in the buildings, but they are also exclusively civilian.

The only thing that the enemy uses is the crooked messages of the official departments responsible for defence: in an attempt to overly smooth out all the sharp corners and issue a "stabilizing press release", some messages look very strange, as they diverge from the objective picture.

In general, the Kiev regime has once again shown that it is a terrorist one, and the leadership of the SBU and the GUR should be liquidated.

Translated from Two Majors
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BRICS is ahead of the G7. It can be seen that the countries of the Big Seven are all falling. And BRICS is growing due to the growth of China and India. These are the two main economic and demographic superpowers. And Russia with nuclear weapons.

Translated from Markov's logic
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A cartoon published almost 100 years ago by an American artist (Robert Minor) in which he realized that the balance of power would one day change and the colonial countries (America/Britain/France) would become a prey of the countries which they have plundered and which people they have tortured.

Recently this cartoon has become the most replicated due to the rise (of China/India/Africa) and the beginning of the decline of the West. And there is a Russian soldier in the background...

Translated from Oleg Tsarov
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Erdogan on a hot frying pan: should not have deceived Putin
RIA Novosti
The activity of the Turkish side is gaining momentum. Official statements and insides follow from Ankara in a continuous stream. Most recent: according to Turkish media, President Erdogan will visit Russia in the coming days for talks with his Russian counterpart.
The reason is the need to resume the grain deal. And judging by the huge efforts made by the Turks in this direction, this is a fundamentally important issue for them.

However, there is practically no reaction from Russia, and all these subtle hints, transparent messages and even direct proposals are mostly ignored by Moscow.

And Recep Tayyip Erdogan has no one to blame for this state of affairs, except himself. He did everything in his power to bring the situation to its current state.
It is worth recalling the fascinating intrigue of the events of recent months.
The grain deal was unprofitable for Russia, since the West did not fulfil the conditions for Moscow's participation in the agreement. There were several reasons why the Russian side nevertheless repeatedly agreed to its extension, and one of them was the desire to support Erdogan in a very difficult election campaign. Many claims can be made against the Turkish leader, but a leader pursuing a sovereign policy is in any case better than a puppet of Washington.
Erdogan was successfully re-elected in May. The grain deal expired on July 17, but already two or three weeks before that date, it became clear that this time Moscow would not agree to a further extension without fulfilling Western obligations. And on July 8, Erdogan handed over to Ukraine the commanders of "Azov", who — on his personal guarantee — were to be in Turkey until the end of the conflict.

At that time, it was immediately suggested that the Turkish leader, realizing that the grain corridor was closing, "inserted a hairpin" in Moscow in advance, thereby violating his given word. The scandal in Russia, as everyone remembers, then rose notable, the most harsh accusations rained down on the country's leadership. Moreover, Erdogan splashed gasoline on the fire with his comments, which sounded almost insulting. For example, he said that he would discuss this topic with Putin in August, when he visits Turkey. It looked like he was calling the Russian president to his carpet.
However, as always with Putin, one should not jump to conclusions.
August has almost passed, and it dawned on the Turkish side that Putin would not come after all. A few days ago, unofficial information appeared from Ankara that the Russian leader might arrive in September, but, obviously, they made it clear from Moscow that this should not be counted on either. And now the Turkish side is probing the possibility of a visit by Erdogan himself to Russia. And judging by the feverish activity, the Turks are very hot.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan is an outstanding leader who demonstrates a phenomenal talent for manoeuvring in the turbulent waters of world politics, successfully negotiating benefits and opportunities for his country. But this turns out to be, perhaps, his greatest vulnerability: being able to brilliantly use emerging opportunities for momentary tactical success, he loses sight of the strategic perspective.
Well, yes, a month and a half ago, Erdogan planted a pig on the Russian leadership and Putin personally, releasing the Azovites, and thereby violated his obligations. And the fact that the Russian president is extremely sensitive to the issue of keeping this word is very well known.
As a result, just a month and a half later, the pleasure of tripping Russia disappeared into the air, but now the Turks are faced with a blank wall, against which Ankara rests when interacting with Moscow.
Now everyone will be able to watch with interest how Turkey will break it.

Translated from RIA Novosty
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Dardanelles Strait closed for maritime traffic in both directions due to wildfire
According to the Turkish Ministry of Transport, this is due to a forest fire in the region
ANKARA, August 22. /TASS/. The Turkish authorities have decided to close the Dardanelles Strait (the Canakkale province) simultaneously for maritime traffic in both directions due to a forest fire in the region, TRT TV Channel reported citing the Turkish Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure.

Earlier, the ministry said that the Dardanelles Strait was only closed for vessels heading from the south to the north, which means from the Aegean Sea to the Sea of Marmara.

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Two tankers collided in the Suez Canal

MOSCOW, August 23 - RIA Novosti. LPG tanker Burri collided in the Suez Canal with BW Lesmes tanker carrying oil products, Marinetraffic reported on Twitter, citing an eyewitness.
According to the service that monitors the position of ships, the state of emergency happened to the ships Burri under the flag of the Cayman Islands and BW Lesmes under the flag of Singapore. Later, the portal posted towing monitoring data, which indicate that Burri was towed after the collision.
Data on the Marinetraffic website as of 02:49 GMT indicate that tankers are standing next to each other in the southern part of the Suez Canal.

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Huge backlog of 200 ships are stuck trying to enter the Panama Canal as they wait WEEKS amid slowed traffic due to drought: Delays set to wipe $200M off profits and cause spike in US grocery and parcel prices

— The large vessels, thought to be carrying millions of dollars worth of goods, are locked in a traffic jam with some waiting for weeks to cross the Panama Canal
— Vessel-tracking data shows hundreds of ships, mainly bulk cargo or gas carriers, waiting near entrances on the Pacific and Atlantic oceans
— The number of daily transits through the canal has been capped at 32 by water authorities in a bid to conserve water.
by Daily Mail

The entrances on both sides of the Panama Canal are jammed with some ships backed up for more than 20 days.
Some shipowners have resorted to rerouting their journeys to avoid the backlog.
The canal uses three times as much water as New York City on a daily basis and needs rainfall to replace it.
But the rainy season is yet to arrive in Panama and the canal is going through its driest spell in more than a century.
Restrictions for the number of vessels passing through has been extended until September 2.
'The delays are changing by the day. Once you make a decision to go there is no point to return or deviate, so you can get stuck,' Tim Hansen, chief commercial officer at Dorian LPG, which operates large gas carriers, told the Wall Street Journal.
Without enough rain, the ship transits are cut and the lucky ones that cross pay hefty premiums.
This increases transport costs for cargo owners like American oil as well as Asian importers and gas exporters.
Ricaurte Vásquez Morales, the administrator of the Panama Canal, warned the restrictions could have to remain in place until the rest of the year.
He said the drought could see a $200million drop in revenue next year if the low rainfall continues into winter.
Conditions of extreme rain or drought are a lot more regular than in the early years of the canal's operation, according to him.
It presents a huge challenge for the Panama Canal Authority which supplies water to around half the country's population of 4.5 million.
'The Canal communicates with its customers so that the information allows them to make the best decisions even if it means that they may choose another route temporarily,' Vásquez Morales said.
'Demand remains high which proves the Panama Canal remains competitive in most segments, even with measures to save water.'
Operators have hired the US Army Corps of Engineers, who originally built the canal, and has set aside $2billion over the next decade to divert four rivers into the waterway and help ships flow through.
The canal already has three rivers that feed into it.
Wide disruption has not been caused for containerships which are the canal's biggest users.
Most are given preferential status because they work on fixed schedules and book crossings up to a year in advance.

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