demagogue on 6/6/2023 at 17:21
Russia is also claiming it was done by Ukraine, but I was watching some (Western) military consultant explaining how the only military advantage is for Russia, and a desperate one at that. It's Ukraine that's building up for its offensive, so if there's going to be anybody crossing the Dnipro it's going to be the Ukrainians crossing into Russia occupied territory.
Other considerations I saw were that Ukrainian-occupied Kherson is the major city having its water supply threatened (Crimea too, but not as acutely?); it's not really the threat to the Russia-occupied nuclear plant some thought at first; not to mention it looks like a short-game play not a long-game one; and it probably took explosive charges being physically planted in the dam and Russia currently occupies it.
I suppose these things could add to confirmation bias, but it seemed right to me.
heywood on 6/6/2023 at 18:23
Russia has wanted to drain the Dnipro reservoirs to starve the country of resources like electricity production and water for irrigation. As soon as they took control early in the war, Russia diverted water to Crimea. Once all the Crimean reservoirs were full, they started draining the Kakhovka. They already bombed this dam once before, back in November when Ukraine was advancing. That blast only took out the road over the dam. That's also when Russia opened the gates and started draining the reservoir. I remember it being down to record low levels over the winter.
Starker on 6/6/2023 at 19:31
I mean, Russia has been claiming from day one of the invasion that it's actually Ukraine bombing its own cities, etc, any time something emerges that makes them look like barbarians. Even in Bucha, despite the overwhelming evidence, they had the gall to try to claim it was Ukrainians who had killed those people when satellite photos clearly showed the bodies lying on the streets during Russian occupation.
demagogue on 7/6/2023 at 16:55
Reflecting on it, I think I was reacting in line with the news source whose commentary I first watched, DW, which was itself being a bit defensive in responding to Russian claims, when it's kind of giving them too much credit to begin with even in giving a counter-argument. I just saw a good Twitter (
https://twitter.com/TimothyDSnyder/status/1666480705637851136) thread by Timothy Snyder on the problem with so many news outlets bothsiding this. There are a lot doing it much worsely than DW!
serg_kundel on 7/6/2023 at 17:22
Charges were planted in October-November of 2022 and they just decided to blow them now.
As one of the reason, they said, to stop counter-offensive operation (which is definetely happening not there).
Now we have a huge catastrophe on the South of Ukraine.
The interesting thing that, in short term, they destroyed all first lines of their defence.
In long term - they created big water supply problem to the occupied Crimea.
I haven't saw any reaction from UN (actually they were celebrating day of russian language) or some worldwide ecological organisations.
What will be next? Nuclear power plant?
WingedKagouti on 8/6/2023 at 06:43
Quote Posted by serg_kundel
The interesting thing that, in short term, they destroyed all first lines of their defence.
They also made it a lot more difficult to cross the river for an Ukrainian assault on the southern positions.
serg_kundel on 8/6/2023 at 13:56
Quote Posted by WingedKagouti
They also made it a lot more difficult to cross the river for an Ukrainian assault on the southern positions.
I think it's temporary.
Eventually all big water will go on and surrounding grounds will be dry (I hope not becoming something like a desert).
Cipheron on 9/6/2023 at 00:47
Quote Posted by serg_kundel
I think it's temporary.
Eventually all big water will go on and surrounding grounds will be dry (I hope not becoming something like a desert).
I think it's more likely to turn into a boggy mess. While this is also bad and miserable for the Russian soldiers on the south bank of the river, the Russian high command doesn't really care about that as long as it makes it more difficult and costly to cross the river.
Boggy mud also makes it harder for the defenders to run away, and we know how the Russian higher-ups feel about their men running away. So it's ... not great for the rank and file Russian soldiers on the defending bank. The muddy conditions will raise casualties on BOTH sides in case Ukraine launches an operation across the river.
This explains why they were also willing to flood out their own defending positions on the river. Might as well get the most "use" out of their own troops, and if they can try and save themselves, then they're not getting their value for money out of the recruits. /s
Starker on 9/6/2023 at 05:36
The title of the video speaks for itself...
[video=youtube;7_avjzntfOc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_avjzntfOc[/video]
... but it was Russia who blew up the dam.
WingedKagouti on 9/6/2023 at 07:10
Quote Posted by Cipheron
I think it's more likely to turn into a boggy mess.
While the former banks of the river are likely to go that way (at least in the short term), a large portion of the arable land in central Ukraine risks getting turned into a desert in the long term due to losing the primary water supply.
