Good riddance. He was Russia's version of Baghdad Bob. LOL!

Igor Konashenkov, the Russian Ministry of Defese spokesperson, reportedly resigned.

Two U.S. officials, when asked for comment, confirmed that the Biden administration's policy has not changed. "The assistance is for the defense and not for offensive operations in Russian territory," said one of the officials, who was granted anonymity to discuss sensitive issues.

The Russians are "smart now," Ustinova said, "because they know there is a restriction for Ukrainians to shoot at the Russian territory. And we saw all of their military equipment sitting one or two kilometers from the border [near Kharkiv] and there was nothing we could do."

The U.K. government this month lifted a similar restriction on the use of British weapons inside Russia, an announcement made by British Foreign Secretary David Cameron during a visit to Kyiv. "Just as Russia is striking inside Ukraine, you can quite understand why Ukraine feels the need to make sure it's defending itself," he said.

U.S. officials increasingly believe Putin's plans to mobilize new military units, coupled with additional ammunition from Beijing and dwindling Western support for Kyiv, could land him a win in Ukraine — and sooner than expected.

It might not be the win that Putin originally wanted, which was a total takeover of Ukraine. But by the end of this year, he may be able to use his gains to negotiate favorable terms for Moscow, three officials familiar with Western intelligence say.

Ukraine has for months launched strikes inside Russia using its own small drones to attack oil facilities. But officials in Kyiv insist they need the more powerful U.S. missiles to break through Russian air defenses along the border.

"Everybody knew the Russians near Kharkiv [were] bringing the manpower, everybody knew they were bringing a lot of artillery, so what they're aiming at doing now is they're going to turn Kharkiv into the second Mariupol, or Aleppo," Ustinova said.

"We keep coming back to the same problem — that it's Russia telling us what we should be doing," she said. "You're giving us a stick but you will not let us use it."

Imagine how disastrous the policy of escalation management will be if Trump does actually win the election. Absolutely fucking stupid rules and restrictions on Ukraine for 2 years now, slow movement on practically everything, escalation management instead of winning, all that only to end up in Trump winning the election = Ukraine loses the war. Could at least actually try to help Ukraine win the war in case the worst case scenario of Trump winning the election happens, at least give Ukraine a fucking head-start on doing some damage to Russia in case Trump gets in power and abandons them.

It would be nice if things were opened up, but eventually Ukraine will be producing enough drones so that smaller targets like tanks and artillery will be available to strike. It seems like they can really only go after oil depots and whatnot in Russia at the moment. However, they are making more and more drones bc this is what has kept ukraine in the war 

Guys, my only thought on the harsh restriction the US has imposed on Ukraine not being allowed to use US weapons to attack true Russian soil is the nuclear threat.

By this measure, Russia may consider an attack on its soil by Ukraine utilizing US weapons, as an indirect attack by the US against Mother Russia, thus justifying a Russian nuclear response against Ukraine. This communication may have already taken place between Russia and the US using back channels. If this is true, then it would explain why the US has been insisting on this restriction all along.

Meh, they are a bark is worse than the bite kind of communicator, because various nations have angered Russia several times and they've threatened several times but done nothing.  Even Russia isn't so stupid that they will risk nuclear war for something so small and inconsequential. What would they gain from nuking the west? Only the destruction of Russia, and I'm sure that ryyu96 will agree with this. 

Russia's defense minister sacking is part of a larger scandal within Russia with leaks of something having to do with nuclear weapons. Also, two other generals were removed or detained

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/14/world/europe/russia-detains-general-yuri-kuznetsov.html

"Even Russia isn't so stupid that they will risk nuclear war for something so small and inconsequential. What would they gain from nuking the west? Only the destruction of Russia, and I'm sure that ryyu96 will agree with this."

Guys, it all comes down to Putin and his state of mind. If he is a Mad Leader (like Hitler), and believing he is on the brink of losing this war and thus his leadership.....Russia's use of nukes against Ukraine cannot be ruled out. And this state of Putin's self-destruction is what Biden is afraid of.

Think about it, if Russia nuked Ukraine. How would NATO reply? They would certainly not nuke Russia, because Ukraine is not a NATO member !!!

I think NATO already told us their response. A nuke on Ukraine is considered a nuke on the west. If Russia nuked Ukraine, NATO would go to war with Russia, but first without nuclear. The response would be to try to disable all nuclear launch points, which means mass bombing/ precision strikes.