“Oh shit, this is it.”

When rioters toppled the first barricades at the Peace Circle at 12:53 p.m. on Jan. 6, 2021, that’s what government witness and cooperating Proud Boy Matthew Greene remembered thinking, according to his testimony in the recently concluded Proud Boys seditious conspiracy trial. The jury is now deliberating.

Since that morning, when he and about 200 other Proud Boys had assembled at the Washington Monument at 10:00 a.m., he had been wondering what their plan was. At 10:30 a.m., Greene had been surprised when Proud Boy leaders Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs, and Zachary Rehl—all now defendants in the seditious conspiracy trial—led the group on a march toward the Capitol. Greene had assumed that they’d be staying where they were to hear then-President Donald J. Trump’s speech at the Ellipse, just across the street. He also wondered why the Proud Boys had been instructed not to “wear colors” that day—a reference to their usual black and yellow apparel with appropriated Fred Perry laurel logos.

But after reaching the Capitol and then stopping for lunch, the group marched to the bike-rack barricades at the Peace Circle, arriving at about 12:49 p.m. There, Biggs led them in chants Greene hadn’t heard at the previous rally. It wasn’t just the usual “Fuck Antifa! Fuck Antifa!” but also “Whose house? Our house!” and “Whose Capitol, Our Capitol!” When rioters violently toppled those barricades four minutes after the Proud Boys’ arrival, it all suddenly seemed to make sense. “I was putting two and two together and saying, ‘This is it,’” Greene testified. (Many quotations in this article are drawn from my contemporaneous live tweets, not official transcripts.)

Four Proud Boy leaders and one Proud Boy soldier have been on trial since Jan. 12 in a 10-count indictment. The top count is seditious conspiracy, which carries a 20-year maximum prison term. Prosecutors allege that the defendants conspired “to oppose by force the authority of the government of the United States” or “by force to prevent, hinder or delay the execution of any law of the United States.” Specifically, their alleged goal was to “oppose the lawful transfer of presidential power by force.”


Great coverage at link:



https://www.lawfareblog.com/proud-boys-seditious-conspiracy-conundrum

https://twitter.com/PatronDsns/status/1650247363024363520

He has left NPR and has now started his own Substack containing exclusive reporting on the counteroffensive. $8 a month or $80 a year. I think it will be worth it. The columns will be sent by email.

https://counteroffensive.substack.com/p/the-first-substack-dedicated-exclusively?nthPub=41

They are also conducting widespread looting. Previously thesr have been signs of a pending Russian retreat:

"
KYIV, Ukraine — Russian troops are forcibly relocating people from occupied areas near the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, a Ukrainian official said on Sunday, suggesting it could indicate that Moscow’s forces might be preparing to withdraw further from that area ahead of an anticipated Ukrainian counteroffensive.

Russian forces retreated from Kherson in November and decamped to just across the Dnipro River, from where they have continued to launch frequent attacks on the city. In recent weeks, the Ukrainian military has warned that the Russian occupation authorities have been preparing to evacuate civilians from the territory it still controls in the broader Kherson region before any potential counteroffensive.

On Sunday, the Ukrainian head of Kherson’s regional council, Oleksandr Samoylenko, said the evacuations had begun.

“I have information that the evacuation starts today with an excuse of protecting civilians from the consequences of heavy fighting in the area,” Mr. Samoylenko said. He said the troops were “trying to steal as much as they can” as they withdrew."

Ukraine Says Russian Troops Are Evacuating Civilians From Occupied Areas of South https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/23/world/europe/ukraine-russia-kherson.html?unlocked_article_code=GttJoW5x0X6cHODA7lZTLpULem0ChRhseXE0LOe_u215SQ78TPk2KDOpw8uBkwDibbEGQrEtEkYh2uT4cicGluWld_Q_yISy8WwtzCD8v7U5x8HvBkZVmOjXafqQsNsZx3SDg-BKzDnnHSwTntcZYmD68aQSChpNDAHnbw9dCFcfGOsX3GtIvT7i0iK0JvXlGiWgibTjjyzwfieEmu7DNHx1_W1AbUxEUtWKo0ZdOtbdZr0luWsB87ltwg2QX686nSBf-ha2zys9lVFe8xcpn337aYcMYccyf1jQRU0guh5x51JlOO-lCwd0wwoKrUHTpirkagkgoVgbF8u5sctZiU9JvLI6 (no paywall)

Between Army vet kos and Mark Sumner the Daily Kos has great coverage of Ukraine's Freedom War:


Can you feel the buzz in the air? Ukraine’s big counteroffensive is coming! And just like mock drafts before NFL draft day, war analysts (and Russian generals, maybe) are poring over maps, trying to divine Ukraine’s gambit.

Let’s start with the map of all Russian fortifications, painstakingly tallied from satellite imagery by the American Enterprise Institute’s Brady Africk. (Yeah, yeah, it’s a right-wing think tank, but this map is solid.)


We’ve discussed this before. There are two obvious moves.




The circled city is Starobilsk, where literally all the roads and rail lines in this vast region meet. It’s the logistical hub of Russia’s war effort in the region. Remember how liberating Kupiansk forced Russia to retreat from all of Kharkiv oblast? Liberate Starobilsk, and Russia will be forced to abandon most of Luhansk Oblast. Meanwhile, key supply lines from Belgorod and other Russian cities to Ukraine’s north would need to be rerouted.

Ukraine would need to punch through Svatove, to Starobilsk’s west, while putting pressure on Kreminna to keep Russia from overcommitting to the north. Now here’s the interesting part. Take a look at the map of Russian fortifications:

https://m.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/23/2165137/-Ukraine-Update-So-many-counterattack-options-but-here-s-one-that-could-break-Russia

South of Kherson City. Neither confirmed nor denied by the Ukraine government:

'Russian milbloggers have provided enough geolocated footage and textual reports to confirm that Ukrainian forces have established positions in east (left) bank Kherson Oblast as of April 22 though not at what scale or with what intentions. Geolocated footage published by a Russian milblogger on April 22 shows that Ukrainian forces have established positions on the Dnipro River bank north of Oleshky (7km southwest of Kherson City) and advanced up to the northern outskirts of the settlement on the E97 highway, as well as west of Dachi (10km south of Kherson City).[1] This footage also indicates that Russian forces may not control islands in the Kinka and Chaika rivers less than half a kilometer north of the geolocated Ukrainian positions near the Antonivsky Bridge. Russian milbloggers claimed on April 20 and 22 that Ukrainian forces have maintained positions in east bank Kherson Oblast for weeks, established stable supply lines to these positions, and regularly conduct sorties in the area—all indicating a lack of Russian control over the area.[2] Another milblogger’s battle map claimed that Russian forces do not control some Dnipro River delta islands southwest of Kherson City as of April 22, suggesting possible Ukrainian advances on these islands.[3] Some milbloggers complained that the slow rate of Russian artillery fire due to the over-centralization of the Russian military command allowed Ukrainian forces to land on the east bank.[4] Russian forces may be prioritizing maintaining defenses in urban areas such as Oleshky and Nova Kakhovka, leaving the islands in the Dnipro River delta unmanned. The extent and intent of these Ukrainian positions remain unclear, as does Ukraine’s ability and willingness to maintain sustained positions in this area. ISW is recoding territory on the east bank of the Dnipro River to Ukrainian-held only now because this is the first time ISW has observed reliable geolocated imagery of Ukrainian positions on the east bank along with multi-sourced Russian reports of an enduring Ukrainian presence there.'

https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-april-22-2023

Possible first small steps of the counter offensive.

https://twitter.com/rtenews/status/1646980726469033986

I won't do links but it is all over Twitter. Tucker Carlson, MTG, D'Souza, every right wing nut job commentator on the internet. They all are describing him as a hero.
The new MAGA martyr.

Rising from humble origins in Scotland, Roy took a modest family-run printing business and built it into Waystar Royco, one of the largest media and entertainment conglomerates in the world. His expansive holdings included the perennially top-rated ATN, Hollywood giant Waystar Studios, Brightstar Adventure theme parks and newspapers including the influential tabloid the New York Globe.



To his supporters, Roy, known for his dismissive catchphrase “f— off,” was an unapologetic champion for conservative voices in mainstream media and a living example of the free market, by-the-bootstraps policies he espoused. To his detractors, Roy was — more than any other single figure — responsible for coarsening the political discourse in the United States, eroding public trust in journalism and providing a platform for xenophobia, misogyny and climate denialism.

Roy leaves his media empire in a perilous state of transition that began nearly five years ago when he suffered a debilitating stroke. The health crisis triggered a heated battle among his adult children to succeed him as chief executive of Waystar Royco, turmoil that was intensified by a scheme involving hush-money payments to women sexually assaulted by former executives in the company’s cruise division, which raised questions about Roy’s leadership and resulted in a Senate hearing. The mogul attempted to deflect blame for the scandal — and the ensuing cover-up — onto his second-oldest son, Kendall. But in a stunning public rebuke, the younger Roy alleged that his father was aware of the abuses and had personally approved financial payouts to the victims.

The ugly father-son rift was typical of Roy, who was nearly as ruthless in his private life as he was in the boardroom.

A member of Roy’s inner circle recalled a time when the media titan phoned Kendall’s assistant with a savage message: “I’m gonna grind his f— bones to make my bread.”


https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/tv/story/2023-04-09/logan-roy-succession-dead-obituary?utm_campaign=wp_power_up&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_powerup

This appears to be a major breach of Pentagon security:


WAR IN UKRAINE

WSJ NEWS EXCLUSIVEEUROPE
Pentagon Investigates More Social-Media Posts Purporting to Include Secret U.S. Documents
Documents include details on Ukrainian forces, U.S. arms provided
By Yaroslav TrofimovFollow
and Nancy A. YoussefFollow
Updated April 7, 2023 6:23 pm ET


'The Pentagon is investigating social-media posts that purport to reveal highly classified U.S. government documents on the war in Ukraine and other key international topics, in what could be one of the most dangerous intelligence breaches in decades.

Well over 100 images, marked with “Top Secret” and other classifications indicating they represent highly sensitive U.S.-produced intelligence, were posted in the Discord message board of fans of the Minecraft computer game around March 1. While many of them were deleted recently, open-source intelligence researchers have managed to download more than 60 files.'

I was able to read the entire story through the Twitter link. This sounds like a disaster for Ukraine.
Yaroslav Trofimov is a great reporter who has been covering the war.

https://twitter.com/yarotrof/status/1644459346200256512