SeborrheicDermatitis

That's fully understandable and probably the better take tbh. If I was in social science mode I'd agree with you, this is just my rough vibe from collating stuff so I fully appreciate that.

Tbf both were a sign of a troubled state but the Wagner mutiny was waaaaaaaaayyy more serious than Jan 6.

If he manages to wiggle out of this one I will lose it I swear haha.

I have a few friends who do that I trust in this matter + I follow a lot of people on both sides of the war (support-wise) who do speak Russian and who report it into English. While this doesn't give as good a view as someone who actually speaks Russian, it still provides a good view overall and I haven't had any reason to doubt my conclusions on this matter accordingly.

Of course, you are under no obligation to believe me, and I obviously wont take offence or whatever if you disagree, it's just what I believe based on the evidence I have collated. It's impossible to be certain until proper quantitative data is put together in a good study, though.

There has been no quantitative data released but based on solid reporting in re-taken areas e.g., Bucha it is evident that there were large-scale arbitrary executions.

By contrast, Russian media has presented little evidence of large-scale executions. There have been individual cases but there is no evidence to suggest it is as systemic.

While you are right to critique my claim, which I should not have made with such certainty perhaps, one can collate the available evidence and make a claim with reasonable-albeit not total-confidence. If Russia did have evidence of large-scale execution of PoWs, they'd obviously put it in their own friendly media outlets + it would be in Russian Telegrams.

Bad source for sure though there is ample evidence (you can watch videos of it) of quite large-scale execution and torture of PoWs among Russian and Wagner troops. It has happened on both sides but certainly far more on the Russian side...

I don't think volunteers in the army itself count as mercenaries. Certainly I see no reason why international law as such doesn't apply to them.

I really don't think it is good to justify arbitrary executions of PoWs.

The Taliban were willing (after a bit of threatening and cajoling) to hand Osama bin Laden over to a third party for him to go to trial. There was no need to invade based on the justification as the Taliban were genuinely afraid of the invasion and were willing to co-operate, just as they have been now. In the end, the invasion did nothing anyway and Al Qaeda's peak came AFTER the Taliban was toppled. There was never any chance of a cohesive post-Taliban government emerging from the Northern Alliance. By this point the US had decided on war and the whole MIC machinery was rolling, so it was too late to turn back (as US leaders thought, with their reliance on a captured media and lobbying from the MIC creating strategic liabilities within the US state).

The invasion was not necessary for US security aims and certainly could never have bettered Afghanistan, though.

Not sure if they're targeting it that effectively, not seen articles saying so yet but might be wrong. I think they're targeting civilian infrastructure as much as strategic infrastructure (same mistakes the Nazis made in the Blitz!).

If that's their actual justification rather than just what they tell the media then it is flabbergastingly incompetent.

Maybe they just didn't want to deplete their own stocks and don't really care how the counteroffensive goes as long as they can continue selling weapons but then there are flaws in that logic, too, since it degrades the idea of invincibility and total technological superiorty that the western MIC have tried hard to portray in recent years. I don't know, maybe there are just idiots in the top brass of the US political-military institutions but you'd think they'd be more smart than thinking "gumption" can carry the day.

I agree with you in terms of the dysfunction of Ukrainian political strategy surrounding Bakhmut. Politicians w/ no military planning experience intervening in what was previously a well-run campaign to achieve a symbolic victory against the advice of their own generals and even western advisors.

Though it was a big blunder on the Ukrainian side, yes. Political leaders interfered in military strategy when they shouldn't have done. IIRC DW reported that some senior Ukrainian military leaders wanted to make a tactical withdrawal but the government vetoed it.