Zelensky US Debacle, West Mocks Victory Plan; Rus Storms Vuhledar, Fall Imminent; Selidovo Retreat [PART 2 of my notes on 1 hr 11 min video]

PART 1 (posted yesterday)

PART 2 (below, starting at 33:46 minutes into the video)

Mercouris: "I have to say this, but as of this moment, it seems to me as if two of Ukraine's best brigades, the 92nd and the 46th, have been sacrificed to no military purpose. It seems, if one believes what the 46th brigade are saying, for only one purpose, which is to maintain President Zelensky's prestige intact while he goes to the United States." That is the terrible situation in Vuhledar.

A little further north, in southwestern Donbas, in a number of areas, the Russians are trying to break the Ukrainian groups defending the cities. All of these little battles actually form one great battle. The Russians aren't merely aiming to capture the towns like Vuhledar, Selidovo, Pokrovsk etc., they are also aiming to destroy the Ukrainian military in those areas.

35:33

This morning (Sept 26), reports of Russian advances in (ransomnote: he names towns I can't spell here). If true, not just that the Russians are extremely close to Karahkovo (sp?), it would mean the Russians have surrounded Ukrainian troops. This might be a misread of the map, but if it turns out to be true, it would be very significant.

A little further north, the Russians have advanced westwards from Ukrainsk. (ransomnote: towns and troop movements here that I can't follow). There are reports that Russian troops have outflanked Silidovo from the north. Ukrainian sources are speaking of Silidovo having been surrounded on 3 sides.

39:39

Mercouris saw a report from Ukraine (which can be found on Simplicus the Thinker's Substack blog) that the Ukrainians are now thinking of withdrawing from Selidovo, Karahkovo (sp?) and Toretsk, all of these places because they've all become undefendable. Withdrawing from areas like this would be out of character for Ukrainians, so Mercouris expects them to continue fighting there. If there's a serious risk of encirclement, they could decide to withdraw. Likely a week or two of serious fighting lies ahead before the Ukrainians withdraw from Selidovo, but even the Ukrainians are admitting they are losing Selidovo.

41:00

Further north, still, the Russians continue to bomb and shell Pokrovsk/Myrnograd and other villages. Russians are now storming Nikolyvka, and there is only one settlement to north of there - Myrnograd (sp). Even as of now, there is no fortified system, effective fortifications to defend Myrnograd and Pokrovsk or prolong the storming of this urban area. Very very bad situation there too. Weeks ago, Mercouris heard about some kind of stabilization there, but Mercouris didn't believe it, and all of those hopes and claims have been proven wrong, untrue.

Perhaps because events in Vuhledar, Pokrovsk, and Silidovo have been so dramatic, there has been less reporting on the situation in Toretsk. Mercouris makes the point that if the Russians are really storming central Toretsk, where Ukrainians have been entrenched and have even demolished their own tall buildings to prevent them from falling under Russian control, then the Russians have pressed far deeper into Toretsk than any independent blogger, mapping program, or reporting channel acknowledges, be it Russian or Ukrainian, and we could suddenly find that the situation for the Ukrainians have deteriorated much more than we realized. This is also true in Chasiv Yar and Syversk (sp?).

45:23

There is an awful lot of information coming out, trickling out from Lymon (sp?) direction, and continuing information about Kupinsk (sp?). Continuing Russian advances - the eastern bank of both of these rivers are falling under Russian control.

We've had rather interesting information from Volchansk, Group of Forces North (Russian) informed us that they had captured most of the high rise buildings in Volchansk, and on that basis, Mercouris said it looked to him as if the battle of Volchansk was about to end, with Russians ending the battle. But if Group of Forces North were lying (Russian forces can sometimes be 'economical with the truth'), or possibly there have been developments, but Group of Forces North said today (9/26) that they had withdrawn from the area of the aggragate plant, south of the high rise buildings, an area which is massively fought over. The Ukrainians are showing video of their soldiers within the area, unfurling their flags. This is one place on the battle lines where the Russians have retreated.

47:58

There are all sorts of claims, on the Russian side, that this is a carefully laid trap, that the Russians withdrew because the area has been obliterated, that by withdrawing the Russians can drop massive amounts of bombs and shells, thermobaric warheads, inflict massive losses on the Ukrainians. There have been instances where the Russians have done that.

Mercouris recalls in 2022, at the start of the war, a US Marine officer, writing under the pen name 'Marinus', wrote a piece in the U.S. Marine Corps Journal in which he spoke about this - the Russians are in the practice of laying firetraps, they withdraw from particular positions, lure their enemy in, and then launch massive fire on territority they have charted and plotted exhaustively, so they are able to cover every square meter if ground. So if the current story is true, then it would not be unprecedented. American Marine officers have written about this, and it is a known Russian tactic.

However, it is at least as plausible that Group of Forces North, already has its hands full dealing with fighting in Kursk as well, and also pushing forward toward Kharkiv, have decided that for the moment the battle of Volchansk can wait. They've secured some positions in the area of the high rise buildings; maybe the aggragate plant is not as important now as it was a few weeks ago, having redployed many of their forces and sent supplies further west in Kursk region. Given that, it may have made sense for them to fall back, allowing it to return to Ukrainian control, while expecting to return later and take the whole of Volchansk when they do.

51:05

Mercouris notes that he leans more toward the latter view, than he does the idea of a trap or cunning plan. But, as Mercouris always says, the Russian military do not share their plans with him (Mercouris is laughing), he says he's not on the ground or sure what's going on, but he knows the Russians have withdrawn from the aggragate plant and the Ukrainians have occupied it.

The Group of Forces North continues to move forward. They claim that in the Kursk area they have advanced another 2 kilometers, they don't explain where/how/in what way.

Yesterday's, there were report (9/25) the village north of Suzha, Malyova Loknya (sp?), has fallen under Ukrainian control; Mercouris has seen no photographic or film evidence that confirms this is true. Group of Forces North have said nothing about it as of 9/26, but they did say that south of Sudzha, their men have reached the village of  'Plekovo' (sp?), southeast of Sudzha on the Ukrainian border, close to the main road between Sudzha and Ukrainian city of Sumy, the road the Ukrainians use to supply their soldiers in Kursk region.

The Russians are now very close to another Ukrainian village, Sverlykovo (sp?), located to the west of this road. As Mercouris has said before, if the Russians take control of these two cities, then the Ukrainians in Kursk run the very real risk of being completely cut off. That would be a disaster for Ukraine, a disaster if the Ukrainians fail to withdraw their troops from what Mercouris believes will be the Korakovo (sp?) cauldron or pocket in south western Donbas.

Suggestions are that there's about 20 thousand Ukrainian troops in this area; if these troops all find themselves surrounded, it would be a catastrophic disaster for Ukraine. Mercouris has heard the total size of Ukrainian forces operating in the Sumy and Kursk area is about 30 thousand. Not all are in Kursk. Mercouris proposes the estimate of between 10 or 15 thousand are in the Kursk area; if they are cut off, surrounded or have to fight to the death, it would be a severe disaster for Ukraine. It's army is already over extended accordng to all objective reporters of the war, including Ukraine's, they are running short of supplies and equipment.

The Ukrainians can't afford to lose this many men in either Korakova or in Kursk. Bad military decisions, to fight for every milimeter of territory (Kursk, Korakovo, Selidovo, Vuhledar, and ultimately Pokrovsk) bad decisions of this kind open the possibilities for this kind of disaster. This mirrors bad decisions in Bakhmut, Mauripol and (mercouris names more cities) where Ukrainians sacrified huge numbers of men to defend undefendable ground.

56:09

We will see what military and political consequences will be in Ukraine will be if anything like that happens, and whether the Ukrainians allow that to happen or break from their own president rather than abandon the men in these places.

Russians have been making comments about proposals for negotiations. Kremlin/Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has again repeated the observation that if deep strikes with western missiles are made against Russia, then per Putin's statements 2 weeks ago, the Russians would regard such strikes as an act of war by whichever western powers were involved.

The Russians have also said it would be unjust and oppressive if they were forced into negotiations which they didn't believe in, which could only have unsatisfactory outcomes. Mercouris has seen this information in TASS but hasn't found the actual citation, but his recollection is that this comment was made by a member of Russia's delegation to the United Nations for the General Assembly meeting in New York. That delegation is led by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who will be in New York the same time all the western leaders are there, and when Zelensky is there. If the western powers want to talk to Lavrov, they can do so, but Mercouris doubts that any will.

More importantly, Russia's ambassador to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya has now made a statement that any negotiations that do not address the 'cancer' of the crisis (that's how he referred to the regime in Kiev) would be unacceptable to Russia, and won't succeed.

59:30

The Russians have at various times made statements essentially confirming that regime change is now their objective in Ukraine. Nebenzya is not the most authoritative person to look to for a comment like that. It would lack the significance or consequence it would otherwise have if said by Putin himself, or Shoigu, Lavrov or somebody at that level. But Nebenzya is a serious and important diplomat, representing Russia at the UN. He's Russia's point of contact in the international community. He is the Russian diplomat with more interactions with senior diplomats of western powers than any other. Mercouris takes Nebenzya's comment, as he takes all Nebenzya's comments, as extremely serious.

This is the general situation. Zelensky's 'victory plan' has proved unimpressive and Mercouris thinks it's backfiring on Zelensky. Mercouris thinks the west doesn't like the way Zelensky is trying to push them to decide on an accelerated NATO entry for Ukraine, which has been effectively ruled out by the west. Mercouris believes that after another period of pressure and badgering by other countries to negotiate, the Russians once again feel the pressure is now off and that's why Nebenzya has made the statements about regime change in Ukraine that he has.

One particular intrigue: A Reuters article purports to quote Iranian President Pezeshkian talking about Russian aggression in Ukraine. Within hours, the Iranian foreign minister said that no such statement had been made and that the Reuters article was fake. Mercouris notes he does not speak Farsi, nor does he follow everything President Pezeshkian says so he can't confirm the Reuters article (fake or not). But Mercouris is suprised that, if the Reuters article was fake, President Pezeshkian did not come out himself to refute it. The fact that the foreign minister contradicted the Reuters quote indicates the statement is not the view of the Iranian government.

103:44

British media recently published many stories connected with the assassination of the Hamas political chief, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran, (in Daily Telegraph) which Mercouris analyzed in detail and didn't believe, didn't think they made sense, that they seemed to be made by briefings with the officials of The Daily Telegraph (who are fervidly pro Israeli), and that he didn't believe any Iranian official wishing to leak a story to the western media would choose the Telegraph to leak it to, if only because it would put them at serious risk domestically from their Iranian critics. Mercouris said the stories seem intended to stir dissension between Iranian President and other Iranian authoriaties

Subsequently, Mercouris and Glen Diesen (sp?) recorded a program with the former British diplomat, Alistair Crooke, who explained the structural, hierarchical reasons why it would be impossible for the President of Iran to reach out to the west, and others, as the articles in the Daily Telegraph alleged he has been doing.

106:06

Here's another article from Reuters, which appeared a few weeks after those previous articles in the Daily Telegraph, alleging that the President of Iran made a statement about 'Russian aggression'. Mercouris says to him it looks like someone in London is trying to make problems for the President of Iran, within the Iranian government. at a time of political crisis, feeding doubts about Iranian President's loyalty to the Iranian Guard Corp, which he is said to be quarreling with, according to the articles in the Daily Telegraph in addition to feeding doubt about Iran's president to the Russians, who would not like to have their operation in Ukraine described as agression.

Mercouris can't refute the story categorically. The Iranian President has made statements that he wants improved interaction with the west, so it may be he did say something negative about the Russians. It would surprise Mercouris given that Iran's president has been meeting senior Russian officials a lot recently, including former Defense Minister Shoigu, and that he's on the brink of signing a strategic partnership agreement with Russia, negotiated mostly with Shoigu. Mercouris thinks it's unlikely, and believes it's more likely that someone in London trying to stir trouble, and that is what the articles in the Guardian and Telegraph are actually telling us.

Mercouris concedes he may be wrong. He says if Iran's president really trying to distance himself from Russia while quarreling with the Iranian Guard Corp, then he's taking on numerous enemies at one time. Again, Mercouris doesn't believe any of this is happening.

109:24

Mercouris says, if you come across these reports, Simplicus the Thinker extensively covers these purported comments of Iran's President in his blog piece, which Mercouris mentioned earlier in this video. Simplicus gives some credence to the assertions that Iran's president said the remark about Russia. Mercouris disagrees.