Exactly. Send more weapons to Ukraine. Equip them to strike Russia's oil industry and airfields. If Russia has consequences it doesn't like, it will stop escalating.

Sadly, Janis Kluge's regional data suggest russian Q2 recruitment was closer to ~90k. He thinks the smaller number of federal payouts was likely them delaying payments. We should see by year end. bsky.app/profile/jakl...

The GOP have worked to stop peace since 2023. Finally a mainstream report on that - good job Bloomberg on being the first I've seen to explain to people how Republicans have helped the war escalate. Why won't they fund Ukraine or sanction Russian tankers to bring peace closer? Can anyone guess?

1-19th September daily expenses 83m rub/day. Down by 10% versus last year's 92m rub/day. Wait for end of month spending to confirm but the hope is that expenses increase Vs last year.

15th Sep, didn't see posted elsewhere? Interfax, Russia: "to consider ... reducing the mineral extraction tax (MET) on gas for Gazprom by an amount that could be obtained by withdrawing tariff windfall profits from independent producers" Gazprom struggling maybe?

1\ Good find below. I predicted Russia's budget problems in March. I still expect they will keep playing games like this to delay financial reckoning. 200bn from VTB in August. Another 200bn through this surprise tax.

Russia now sent jets into NATO airspace. Russia's past behaviour says that either NATO sends more weapons to Ukraine in response to stop the escalation, or they are begging for more. Shooting down russian jets the moment they enter also worked for Turkey.

This is funded by other countries. Because of Republicans, Ukraine has received tens of billions less aid than they should have. Many Ukrainians are needlessly dead, much of the Russian army has been saved. And the Republicans have successfully extended the war for Putin.

The flood of identified Russian war dead continues on the Poteru database. 4,106 1st-17th September. About 240/day... Higher than any complete month. And many more will not have public obituaries. This is very likely due to changes in Russian reporting, lots of old deaths being reported now.

This seems absurdly obvious. To deter Russia, you must do something they don't want in response to their provocations. If every incursion was met with large new packages to Ukraine, they would stop. And it would be far cheaper than the apparent European tactic of begging Russia to carry on.

Republicans could sanction the shadow fleet to cut russian revenue at any time. They intentionally blockaded aid to Ukraine since 2023, to save Putin, get more Ukrainians killed and prevent peace. Their actions say they support Russia's victory, but they're smart enough not to say it out loud.

1\ Newer satellite imagery shows that Russia seems to have fewer than 100 decent condition BMP-1/2/3 IFVs left in visible storage. 329 PRP-3 artillery spotter vehicles plus 82 likely actual IFV versions. 4,336 have been pulled from outdoor storage.

The main Russian oil tax is only paid on oil prices over $15. Oil at $60? Taxes paid on $45. Oil at $50? Taxes paid on $35. 17% lower price = 23% lower russian income. Squeezing russian oil profits is the most important thing. We need republicans to switch sides and start sanctioning tankers.

This is a distraction from republicans helping Putin find his war. If you want to cut russian oil profits, you enforce a price cap with sanctions on tankers so the price cap works. Since republicans took power, they stopped issuing any new sanctions on tankers. Zero. Sanction the tankers.

Good thread below. One interpretation of Ukraine's current operational scale tactics. It does fit a lot of the videos I've seen.

This whole prune thread is good but the conclusion below is a good summary.

The Poteru database of IDd russian war dead is now lagging so I will be slow at reporting its updates now. 1357 names added 1st-6th September. Zero in the following days.

2022: "it would cost a little to stop Russia and have peace, waah I don't want to 😭" 2025: "it would cost a little more to stop Russia and have peace, waah I don't want to. 😭 I should have done it earlier but now it's worse waah I don't want to 😭" 2030: "why is it so expensive and bloody 😭"

1\ Updated "dumb" forecast of Russian deficit based only on past performance and official Russian data. Course for end of year is now 9.8 trillion roubles, vs official plan of 3.8tr. I sincerely doubt it'll be that big for reason I list below. But it still looks like they'll blow up their budget.

1\ First guess scenarios for year-to-date Russian federal budget deficit after September, vs current 4.2tr. Oil&gas estimates are not well refined, I need to work on those. Unlike August where I confidently predicted a monthly surplus, September could go either way. Range of 3.4-4.3tr YTD.

1\ Russian budget deficit after August 4166bn rub, a little above my "mid-mid" scenario of 3985bn. What happened? 👉oil revenue 505 (below my low 510) 👉 other revenue 2904 (vs my mid 3004) 👉expenses 2726 (vs my mid 2679). My first guess was pretty close again. Russia STILL on course to blow budget.

Ok so plan is similar oil prices to 2025, plus "a serious expansion of social security for the population" (Russian government says that, not me) plus a "balanced" budget? Hmmm.

1\ how did Russia get 75% more profit tax despite only raising rates 20->25% from 2024 to 2025? Because most goes to the regions. The rate of tax that goes to the federal government went from 3% to 8% or +166%> Revenue increased by less than half that. Not so impressive.

If you want less money for Russia, you do sanctions that lower russian oil prices. Biden did this regularly. There are zero new sanctions published on OFAC since the Republicans took power. Republicans are stopping the effective sanctions. They are helping Russia fund its continuing war.

1\ Here's some info on how Russia funded its 2024 budget deficit, based on their actual documents. Of the 3.5tr deficit, almost 1.2tr was funded by rises in the gold price and the weakening rouble. I haven't seen much made of this before... groktown.substack.com/p/how-russia...

Europe: Watch it Russia! Once you agree to a ceasefire we’ll arm Ukraine to the teeth & send air support & troops to keep the peace Russia: Cool thanks for the heads up. We’ll escalate the killing now then & ensure no ceasefire ever happens so we can keep destroying Ukraine undisturbed 👌

Republicans have worked to reduce aid to Ukraine and stop new sanctions on Russia. Massive help to Putin to drag out the war and get more Ukrainians killed. It is gross and misleading when media headlines pretend there are "peace efforts".

1\ My guess for the Russian deficit by end August was 3.4-4.5 trillion rub, now 3.4-4.3tr. A monthly surplus is likely, as in 2023&2024 with low August spending + revenue from big dividends by state-owned companies. Watch for HOW BIG it is. >4tr good news, <3.4tr = bad news. In between=grey zone.

Check out this fundraiser from Liberty Ukraine. Amazing work, please help if you can. If not. Share Constantine's post (not my post - the one linked below).

1\ It's September in Ukraine and August 2025 ranks 2nd for the number of Russian war obituaries found by Poteru. Just below Dec '24 and above July '25. Thanks to excellent new research by Mediazona/Meduza/BBC, I conclude a major cause is recent reporting on older deaths.

Republicans are continuing to blockade new aid packages to Ukraine, helping to get more Ukrainians killed. Republicans have stopped new sanctions on Russia, helping Russia to fund its war and get more Ukrainians killed. Those are their actions. I think actions speak louder than words.

1\ follow ChrisO for great threads. I think a slight misstatement below; recently "In most cases, the claims are filed by the Ministry of Defence" since "Military units want to remove...(the dead whose bodies have not been evacuated) from their personnel lists in order to recruit new soldiers."

1\ Another batch of identified Russian war dead added to Poteru data; even before finishing, August moves into second bloodiest month with 5,973. There's often a multi-month lag, many of these died ages ago. Russian probate court data suggest that for every obituary, there are 1.75+ actual deaths

It would be much cheaper and bring peace forward faster if those €200 billion were spent on Ukraine's defence, instead of waiting for Russians to murder and blow up things even more.

1\ Update from mediazona/meduza/BBC on statistics of Russian war dead from probate courts. ~220k, or ~1.75x their obituary count. Excludes non-russians, WIA, POW and possibly some missing, but read the article to understand. en.zona.media/article/2025...

Russian announced August spending currently on course for the low expenses scenario. My scenarios for what Russia will announce as year-to-date deficit by end August? 3.4-4.1 trillion roubles.

Nearly ready with my FP-5 Flamingo heavy cruise missile cutaway, likely share tomorrow

In the first half of 2025, Russian military spending was close to $300 billion (purchasing power parity). Usually, there is more military spending in the second half of the year, so Russian military spending of $600 billion PPP in 2025 is realistic. Link to source below.

1\ Running faster just to stay still? If I'm reading this right, Russia increased subsidies to its auto manufacturers from ~200bn rub in Jan-Jun 2024 to ~450bn rub in Jan-Jun 2025. Yet Russian vehicle sales are down: cars, buses, tractors, trucks... all down by a lot.

1\ Huge number of new Russian war dead added by Poteru right after the weekend. By the 25th August, it has now reached 5th bloodiest month with 5,039. At 201/day it equals December 2024 for bloodiest yet.

1\ August ain't finished, but it already ranks top-10 for number of Russian war dead identified by the Poteru database. Over 130k Russian war dead identified by name now. Many others won't be publicly announced - and this doesn't count missing/captured/wounded, or non-Russians.

Does anyone know about Russia's 2A36 supply situation? I thought the Giatsint barrels were kinda specific and possibly out-of-production. Kriegsforscher's unit has done nice work, knocking out 3 of them recently.

Republicans: "Russia, if you don't negotiate we will cut off aid so it's easier to kill Ukrainians. Oh and how about we protect you against missiles to ease your war too?". It's despicable negligence that the media report this as anything other than Republicans rewarding Russia for more war.

1\ Janis Kluge's database rocks, check it out. Over Jan-Jun 2025, Russia spent over 1tr roubles on subsidising mortgages. Just over 5% of the budget to pay for old construction and its past GDP boost.

1\ Here's some Russian data on the outstanding volume of subsidised loans to "individual entrepreneurs" and "small and medium sized enterprises". Looks like they rushed cash to people in early 2022, but since then the amount is declining. How much is Russia paying to subsidise these?

One of the best OSINT mappers. Worth following and thanking for posting on bluesky again. Please like and share the post (not my post, the daily map update one)

1\ I think I have FINALLY got evidence to help resolve an issue in Russian finance accounting. This is very technical so expect a future thread explaining later, but if I'm right: 2025 Russian federal finances are worse off than Prune has been saying. (this is good for Ukraine&democracies)

I think the main results of the Alaska meeting: 1. Republicans will continue to block Ukraine aid so more Ukrainians die 2. They ruled out new sanctions on Russia, to help Russia fund the killing of more Ukrainians 3. They bought more time for the Russian offensive. A big Putin+Republican win.

Russian federal military spending was already 8.5 trillion RUB (4% of GDP) in the first half of 2025, almost as much as after three quarters last year and in the full year of 2023. Full year 2025 could be over 8% of GDP... (PS: The charts were made with budget.jakluge.de -> Timeseries).

Another good source on Ukraine. German support is so important for preserving European security and ensuring peace - I recommend following this account.