Sunday, March 6, 2022

Corruption Factor?

 I sat and watched a 'talk' with a journalist and Lt Col Daniel Davis (US Army retired).  The guy is what I'd call a four-star strategist on military affairs, and he put out a unquiet prospective about the Ukraine war.

So he suggested that there is a massive corruption factor connected to the Russian military....probably involving the Kremlin elite and the Oligarch crowd....where money was allocated to X, Y and Z....but never spent there. 

Fake names of soldiers on the payroll, but the money siphoned off?  He didn't go that far, but I seem to recall one of the odd thing discovered during Hurricane Katrina in the US....the police force of New Orleans had a fair sum of fake police on the payroll....with the money siphoned off to corrupt city officials.  It wouldn't surprise me if the new conscript problem explains why suddenly they were 'drafted' and sent to a mini-boot-camp, and unable to perform their basic function.

This suggestion would also explain why front-line new tanks/APCs weren't in the mix of the Russian invasion force.  Maybe they were given the money, and just siphoned that off for their private funds.

Crazy talk?  It would easily explain how a 72-hour invasion got dragged down, and why so many of the conscript guys seem like they were picked up from some street eight weeks ago and seem lacking in skills.  It'd explain the equipment problem as well.

Putin not figuring any of this out?  The guy stays in a controlled bubble, and probably has no idea of the corruption factor going on.  If he woke up to realize this?  He'd go have a few of the corrupt officials killed off.  

If all of this were true?  NATO would be the last force on Earth that you'd really want to engage and fight.  It'd be funny if Putin put total faith into a corrupted military, and his 'legend' is mostly about a one-star force with 1980s hardware in 2022.  

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