FNS=Fast News Share and Quick Comments.

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Russia said the capture of Soledar was “important for the continuation of successful offensive operations in the Donetsk region.” It added that “establishing control over Soledar makes it possible to cut off the supply routes for Ukrainian troops in Bakhmut.”

The significance of Soledar in military terms is minimal. However, its capture would allow Russian forces, and especially the Wagner mercenary group, to turn their focus on nearby Bakhmut, which has been a target since the summer.

https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/russia-ukraine-war-news-1-13-23/index.html

Soledar represents at best a Pyrrhic victory for Wagner as any concentration of force and development of feeding lines is certain to be met with an aggressive Ukrainian military response.

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Dudley, 35, was reported missing last year by authorities in Lansing, Michigan. A spokesman for his family said Dudley had traveled to Europe to backpack, had gone to Poland for a music festival and at some point crossed into Kaliningrad and was detained in April, 2022.

https://www.militarytimes.com/veterans/2023/01/12/russia-releases-us-navy-veteran-who-crossed-border/?utm_campaign=dfn-ebb&utm_medium=email&utm_source=sailthru&SToverlay=2002c2d9-c344-4bbb-8610-e5794efcfa7d

Backpacker Taylor Dudley’s compass and map skills may have been rusty at the time, imho. In any case, no ballyhoo, no need for a swap, just nine months of diplomacy by a veteran in such negotiations, Bill Richardson, former governor (D) of New Mexico. Richardson had a counterpart in Ara Abramyan, a counterpart in negotiating prisoners associated with Russia out of foreign prisons.

Portent?

Possibly, Russia will try begging American patience over the war in Ukraine, and so friendly and quiet a return–never mind the nine months Dudley spent detained–may lend its little bit of color to the larger and more nefarious picture of #PutinFullTonto and a Moscow fully berserk in Ukraine and elsewhere and beyond the pale of humanity.

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President Biden, facing a special counsel investigation amid new revelations of classified documents in his possession after the vice presidency, suddenly confronts a ballooning political problem that threatens to hamstring his agenda and blunt the momentum he hoped to seize at the halfway mark of his term.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/01/12/biden-trump-classified-documents-politics/

Really?

On January 24, 2020, the Foreign Agents Registration Act unit of the National Security Division of the Department of Justice received from Christopher M. Kise, now the lawyer representing Donald John Trump in his defense in relation to the FBI’s investigation of Trump’s holding documents stamped as Top Secret/Secure Compartmented Information (TS/SCI), FARA registration #6787. In the form, Kise had listed as his principle Reinaldo Munoz Pedroza, the Attorney General of Venezuela appointed by the dictator Nicolas Maduro. At that time, Pedrozo had been sanctioned by the U.S. Department of the Treasury for undermining democracy in Venezuela and related election interference.

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2022/09/19/trump-lawyer-christopher-m-kise-registered-foreign-agent/

Has–or had–President Biden a Registered Foreign Agent potentially (and directly) selling out American Democracy via the Maduro-Putin relationship?

One doubts it.

Only Trump has demanded personal fealty over loyalty to the Constitution from powerful Federal subordinates, e.g., and from the git-go, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/i-expect-loyalty-trump-told-comey-according-to-written-testimony/2017/06/07/46413298-4bab-11e7-a186-60c031eab644_story.html .

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Soledar?

Wagner mercenaries have at most captured a salt mine and may now position themselves for greater wholesale slaughter.

Dudley?

It’s good to have him back in the U.S.A.

Biden’s TSI/SC?

Biden’s President, current, sworn to uphold the Constitution and refreshingly authentic about it. The “oops” in a locked garage? Investigation will have to resolve how that classified data got left there and–always the most important question–why.

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