

Discover more from The View from the Front. By Stan R. Mitchell.
The 12/3/21 dispatch.
Happy Friday! Hope everyone has had a great week!
We’ll begin this newsletter with the situation in Ukraine again. Not much has changed, which in itself is quite worrying given the ramped-up tensions already in the area. (If you want a look at what a second Russian invasion of Ukraine would look like, check out Tuesday’s newsletter. I covered that in depth.)
But The Economist pointed out that some military analysts predict an invasion might begin in January. (See article below.)

The list of reasons for this are the following, according to the article:
The flat, muddy terrain of south-eastern Ukraine will be frozen solid by then, allowing Russian tanks to roll in. It is in the middle of the deployment cycle for the conscripts who make up much of Russia’s ground forces. And Russia may find itself with a pretext for invasion, since the new year has in the past brought front-line flare-ups in Ukraine’s war against Russian-backed separatists. Besides, the 100,000 Russian troops massed near the border are more than mere theatre; Russia is setting up field hospitals and calling up its reserves.
The article ends by saying that Putin is “probably bluffing.”
But the thing about Putin is you can never be sure.
And as stated below, Russia will often blame others for doing what it planned to do all along.


One thing Russia ISN’T happy about are stories such, as this:
Russia is increasingly frustrated with NATO’s westward expansion, but it’s Russia’s aggression that continues to fuel that push. As a reminder, American forces were leaving Europe in droves until Putin decided to get violent again, invading parts of Ukraine ten years ago, sending jets to Syria, etc.
In news that isn’t too big, but could end up becoming big, there was this today:
Blinken says Iran does not seem serious about returning to compliance with nuclear deal.
As a reminder, not only has Israel said it would never allow Iran to have nuclear weapons, but even U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in the same article that “Washington will pursue other options if diplomacy fails.”
And finally, in news that shouldn’t surprise anyone, China continues to try to push around its neighbors.


It’s actions such as these, and the one below, that continues to galvanize the world against China. (It didn’t have to be this way.)
Moving along, in tech news, here were a couple of cool stories that I came across:


Finally, before we end with some motivation, I came across the following below. As a huge fan of A-10 Warthogs, this just completely blew my mind.
Did you know that A-10s are great fighters against other aircraft if the confrontation is up close and personal? (Yeah, I didn’t either.)


Thanks for sticking around to the end. Here’s some motivation to round out your week:
That’s it for this post. And as a reminder, please be kind and endeavor to love and support your fellow Americans:
As always, please share this post if you enjoyed it, as well as comment below.
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Semper Fidelis,
Stan R. Mitchell
P.S. Don’t forget to check out my books. I write fast-paced military and mystery thrillers. You can find all ten books here: amazon.com.