Russia - General Discussion.

[koxinga]

I would suspect a combination of incompetence and general mistrust of anything Western, given the current geopolitical climate being the key reasons for this disaster, ala Occam's razor as opposed to a false flag or Russia let it happen.

Given that Western allies and notably the US has unequivocable said it was ISIS-K from the begining and even it early warnings, the false flag operation scenario is out. The Americans would be able to figure it out and would have every incentive to uncover it and stick it to the Russians as a massive propoganda coup. That has not happened.

As for Russia letting it happen in order to justify some kind of more strong action (mobilisation rumour), it seems unlikely to me. If Russia knew, they could have stationed their police and special forces nearby to intercept/ambush the terrorists before reaching.

You still get your dramatic firefight (Russia versus bad ISIS terrorists) and Putin and the security forces look good. Letting the terrorists kill hundreds of citizens when these options are available is unnecessary. Putin and the security forces also look bad.

 

[Big_Zucchini]

I would suggest you forgot the word “alleged” somewhere there, haha.

Yes.

I don’t know if I would call it widely attributed, but there was never anything definitive on the event. Even if assume that the “false flag attack” was the case in 1999, were there many others that are widely regarded this way?

Secret services don't have a tendency to admit their actions. So what we can do is look at the evidence and make our own conclusions. That is why I referred to it as a possibility, not a hard fact.

I don't know about many, nor is it really important. What's more important is to understand whether that is something considered normal for the current state.
On 21st of February 2022, mere days before the Russian invasion into Ukraine, Russian state TV showed a Ukrainian APC tens of kilometers deep in Russia, on a sabotage mission. Only problem is it was a BTR-70M, and Ukraine did not yet have BTR-70M at that point.
Clarification: Both Russia and Ukraine have BTR-70 variants with an 'M' suffix, but those are separate modernization programs. Key difference is in the engine area.

I’d say Russia has a history of terrorist attacks by various radical islamist elements, enough so to conclude that this one was another one of the same (especially when everyone else reasonable suggests just that). Having a border (via and including Kazakhstan) with countries bordering Afghanistan and Pakistan that are prone to radicalization and having hundreds of thousands (mostly) working migrants from there, as well as Chechnya, Dagestan, etc within, should make one walk on their tippy toes as far as islamist terror is concerned. But there are occasional failures by the agencies responsible, especially given the current situation (duh?).

The false flag theory does not exclude that these were terrorists. All evidence available to the public so far, indicates these were muslim terrorists. However there is suspicion that Russia may have intentionally avoided its prevention. Suspicion, not confirmation.
It is healthy for people to be suspicious, and Putin is particularly sussy in such cases.

Actually, we don’t know that for a fact. Unless you are referring to the warnings by various embassies in Russia as a warning. Otherwise, while the Americans said they warned the Russians, the Russians claimed the Americans did not. They also claimed that there is no cooperation between the two countries in regard to this event:

I don't know what is the precise date of this video, it's hard to personally verify because half of Putin's daily schedule is making speeches. But it is considered easily verifiable by the public and it doesn't seem this was contradicted anywhere.
Here we can see Putin brushing off these warnings.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1771312730793726431

This is not to say whether there was an actual warning or not. However, if the current cooperation on this type of issues is at the level of “we warned you by issuing a warning to our citizens in our embassy/ies in your country”… Well, that’s just sad and extremely dangerous for all involved - that is, all of us.

It is very unlikely that the US hadn't warned via more secretive channels in greater detail.

Yes. I also hear there was a false flag op by the CIA to remove Kennedy, as well many other such ops, including 9/11 in order to begin the war in Afghanistan because blah (I would also bet my money that I can find sources among the elected US officials at the time of any particular event). There were also a few false flag ops by the Israeli gubberment, including the seventh of the last October in order to occupy Gaza and blah.

I already addressed this elsewhere. To insinuate other incidents were false flags because they coincide with one parameter used to estimate a false flag in this specific attack, is to objectively fail to understand the arguments being made and the rationale and evidence for a proper false flag.

 

[Vivendi]

As others pointed out, one of the odd things about this incidence was the unusual lack of security at this concert hall, in spite of US warnings about attending concerts... Another odd thing is that it took incredibly long time to get forces there, in spite of a police(?) HQ being in the neighborhood.

Russians are now making jokes on social media that people in the concert hall should have screamed "Navalny! Navalny!" instead of "Help! Help!" -- since the former would have brought police to the scene immediately, the latter seemed to have caused a much delayed reaction...

 

[KipPotapych]

I already addressed this elsewhere. To insinuate other incidents were false flags because they coincide with one parameter used to estimate a false flag in this specific attack, is to objectively fail to understand the arguments being made and the rationale and evidence for a proper false flag.

And to me this incident is no different from the ones mentioned and the insinuations suggest failure to understand the nature of the arguments being made, along with rationale and evidence for a proper false flag.

For instance, search the web for Zimnyaya Vishnya fire a few years ago. Dozens of people burned (half were children) in a building, where the fire started on the top (!) floor, but there was no alarm on the floors below, and as the roof collapsed and the fire was spreading further and further, the occupants of a movie theatre could not get out because all the emergency exit doors were locked. Some people went to prison for a long time for bribery, failure to follow safety procedures, etc.

Бывший гендиректор «Зимней вишни» приговорен к восьми годам колонии за взятку – Коммерсантъ

Центральный районный суд Кемерово вынес приговор бывшему генеральному директору сгоревшего торгового центра «Зимняя вишня» Вячеславу Вишневскому. Он приговорен к восьми годам колонии строгого режима за взятку главе регионального Госстройнадзора при реконструкции здания. Ему также назначили штраф...

www.kommersant.ru

Here, I googled what I suggested above and here is the Wiki page:

2018 Kemerovo fire - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Note that there is also a claim of government cover up, etc. Strange right? Especially because the Russians blamed some Ukrainian prankster for spreading the rumours, who himself confirmed the accusations, which the article talks about.

Then there are claims how strange it is to have no armed men present at the venue even after the the warnings. Again, we have no information about the contacts that were made and the nature of the warnings and intel shared. For all we know, what we all read on the news when the warnings were made to foreigners by their respective embassies in Russia were all the warnings there were. The rest is speculation. Then there is a fact, that I guess is maybe a newsflash for some, it is not a usual practice to have armed security or police present at the concerts and similar events in Russia. Consider that this one was also a fairly small event, relatively speaking, with the venue capacity of around 6,000 people:

На концерт «Пикника» в «Крокусе» были проданы все билеты. В зале в момент теракта могли находиться 6200 человек — Meduza

В зале «Крокус сити холла» в момент теракта могли находиться 6200 зрителей. Об этом пишет «Агентство».

meduza.io

So no, it is not unusual to have unarmed security at an event like that and is actually quite normal. Just like it is here, in the US, through out Europe, I am sure. While I have been to quite a few various performances here and the US, I never attended one in Europe, but I am sure the scenario is the same. Why would it be different? Side note: I, however, have had the memory card in my camera formatted by a cop near Pentagon on a trip to DC many years ago because he thought I should not be taking photos of myself and my wife hundreds of meters away from the building. I thought he was out of line and the idea itself was pretty crazy, but it was what it was and we were visitors. I objected, but we lost a whole of bunch of photos we took through out the (road) trip up to that point and it was unfortunate. Some places take their security more serious than others, I guess. Funny thing is that DC is one of the places I would visit again without a doubt, but back on topic…

Furthermore, provided the current geopolitical environment, if there were no official contacts with provision of good intel in regard to the expected attack(s), it would not be all that surprising if more serious measures were not implemented. Of course, one has to also consider the fact that the side providing the warnings is the side that considers social destabilization in Russia to be the most optimal and desired outcome and reportedly so. That’d be one point that we can speculate about. Another is that we can speculate about the measures that actually were implemented because we don’t know what they were and if there were any. There could be a follow up and no confirmation, or a simple case of failure of the security agencies, which wouldn’t be the first and surely not the last, and Russia is not the only country to have ever been affected by it. Then, of course, we can also speculate that it did not happen in Moscow per se to begin with, while the warning has been posted for Moscow specifically.

Technical Difficulties

Anyway, there are many speculations with little substance.

Then the reports of the police presence near by due to high security alerts (that’d be a contradiction, by the way, to the entire theory of lack of measures) and their inactivity. The Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs claimed that this information had nothing to do with reality, which we can choose to believe or disregard completely. They also claimed that the response took about 5 minutes.

МВД опровергло сообщения о бездействии полиции во время теракта в «Крокусе»

МВД России опровергло распространившуюся в сети информацию о том, что полиция бездействовала во время совершения теракта в «Крокус Сити Холле». Официальный представитель МВД Иpина Волк указала, что автомобиль, запечатленный на распространившихся фото и видeо, является машиной скорой медицинской...

m.lenta.ru

Their account is in accordance with the reports that I read pretty much live as they appeared in the Russian news when the events were unfolding. So I don’t see anything irregular and malicious here.

We can skip on the few other less significant things, because there is no point to talk about it, and go straight for the “motive”. So the theory is that this event was beneficial to the Russian authorities and Putin specifically in order to… blame Ukraine and implement mobilization of hundreds of thousands of people to be sent to the frontline, a measure otherwise “unpopular”. This is laughable at best, frankly. There are Ukrainian forces trying to attack Russia, killing civilians in Belgorod and other regions on daily basis. There are Ukrainian UFVs hitting critical and civilian infrastructure in Russia, including Moscow and Sankt Petersburg regions, also on daily and weekly basis. There are some Euros “planning” to send their troops to Ukraine. There are members of NATO (and the evil reincarnate itself, in particular, the USA) are the providing weapons and most valuably intel on targets, etc. And many more other things, most/all of which are actually happening that can be used for any mobilization scenarios. The script writes itself, no need to make up anything else, really. At the same time, Ukrainians are reporting that Russia has no issues recruiting personnel on voluntary basis.

But let’s say that yes, this was another false flag op by the Kremlin. So they decided to kill about 150 people near Moscow, or simply let it happen, because that was very favourable to their efforts. Efforts to mobilize people outside of Moscow and other major centres, as it was suggested what they do. While at the same time revealing that not only they cannot protect their oil refineries (and other infrastructure) that are critical to the internal operations, as well as external revenues immensely important to their war effort. In fact, they cannot protect citizens next to their capital from a few guys with a combined IQ score likely equivalent to that of a single pineapple. Yes, of course, all that makes a lot of sense and definitely refers to the other parameters used to indicate a false flag operation.

So yes, all this reads just like all other conspiracies out there. There is no need to tell someone that they lack an understanding of something. Especially while reading Geraschenko and the like. Overall, what all this suggests to me, is that there is a complete (and widespread) lack of understanding of how things work, people who have zero clue and never followed Russian events on daily or at least regular basis and have no business “weighing things out” and providing their “expert” opinions; and they do so for various reasons, some just because, others with malicious intent. So when someone from say Norway or Germany or Canada and the USA says that there is something very unusual about some event that takes place in Russia, I am going to beg my pardon and ask why they think this is the case (in this particular instance the substance is missing “bigly”). Then the absolute majority of people will quote or paraphrase those “experts” creating an echo chamber effect. Then Mr Zelensky himself comes in and claims that this was, in fact, the Russian false flag op in order to attack Ukraine. And so on.

Things aren’t usually as complex as people think them to be. The “complexity” syndrome usually appears due to the lack of understanding of any particular subject, lack of information, and, probably most importantly, because the details contradict our normality. Disinformation and circumstances should not be discounted either, surely.

It could also, of course, be the case that I am completely wrong and this was a false flag op by the Kremlin. I am sure the Wikipedia will provide answers in the years to come and the next similar event that will unfortunately, but undoubtedly happen would reference this one as well due to the amount of “doubt” and the “logic” suggesting and so on.

 

[koxinga]

More importantly and I emphasis, the US has from day 0 insisted that this was a genuine ISIS-K attack.

If there is any smell of a false flag operation by the Russians, the Amercians have every incentive to lay this bare or to insinuate as such. Nothing at all.

 

[Fredled]

@koxinga It was not a false flag operation, but they intentionally let the venue without protection. Even in normal time, and without terror attack warning, you would see a significant security deployment. This is one of the most famous concert room in Moscow. And on this day, they were noticeably absent.
This can't be mere negligence.

Had they knew that the terrorists would kill 130 people, they may have tried to prevent it. Maybe. But it won't be the first time Putin miscalculated.

@Vivendi Indeed, there were many times more police forces deployed at Navalny's burial than on the terror attack site. It shows that in Russia, police forces are used to repress people instead of protecting them.

 

[Musashi_kenshin]

You still get your dramatic firefight (Russia versus bad ISIS terrorists) and Putin and the security forces look good. Letting the terrorists kill hundreds of citizens when these options are available is unnecessary. Putin and the security forces also look bad.

Then again if no civilians are dead you can't have any public outrage. Putin would benefit from public anger directed to external threats, especially as the war in Ukraine takes an ever greater toll on the Russian public due to cuts in public spending. He's not yet in full oppression mode, he wants public admiration.

I am not suggesting that this is a reason to support a Russian false-flag plot, but I am setting out why Putin might kill Russian civilians or allow them to die.

 

[koxinga]

Then again if no civilians are dead you can't have any public outrage. Putin would benefit from public anger directed to external threats, especially as the war in Ukraine takes an ever greater toll on the Russian public due to cuts in public spending. He's not yet in full oppression mode, he wants public admiration.

I am not suggesting that this is a reason to support a Russian false-flag plot, but I am setting out why Putin might kill Russian civilians or allow them to die.

Which is unsubstantiated speculation that errs on the side of "Putin is evil and is manipulating events" versus "Putin is paranoid incompetent and won't trust anything that Western intelligence says". From a reasoning standpoint, it would require proof, or at the very least, statements of questions by authorative sources (E.g US / European leaders)

@koxinga It was not a false flag operation, but they intentionally let the venue without protection. Even in normal time, and without terror attack warning, you would see a significant security deployment. This is one of the most famous concert room in Moscow. And on this day, they were noticeably absent. This can't be mere negligence.

I have no more information that what I read in the news and anything more is speculation. It might be puzzling, but we have seen examples of "noticeably absent" defenses in the war around Russian airfields, naval bases, troop concentrations where they are painfully obvious high value targets.

Am I to infer some greater reasons for it? If we are willing to laugh at the grossly incompetent behaviours of the battlefield, why is the same yardstick not applied to local security forces?

 

[Big_Zucchini]

Am I to infer some greater reasons for it? If we are willing to laugh at the grossly incompetent behaviours of the battlefield, why is the same yardstick not applied to local security forces?

There is a difference between intentional and unintentional incompetence.
Russia's armed forces are incompetent on many different levels - because that's how they were designed to operate. Yes there was some corruption involved which is obviously not part of that design, but you generally don't want an overly competent armed force if you think the main threat to your rule is a coup.

 

[KipPotapych]

@koxinga It was not a false flag operation, but they intentionally let the venue without protection. Even in normal time, and without terror attack warning, you would see a significant security deployment. This is one of the most famous concert room in Moscow. And on this day, they were noticeably absent.
This can't be mere negligence.

Had they knew that the terrorists would kill 130 people, they may have tried to prevent it. Maybe. But it won't be the first time Putin miscalculated.

@Vivendi Indeed, there were many times more police forces deployed at Navalny's burial than on the terror attack site. It shows that in Russia, police forces are used to repress people instead of protecting them.

“Intentionally left the venue without protection” and “even in normal time you would see a significant security deployment”. How do you figure? What makes you think that is the case? Again, this is like an “MTV Unplugged” type of venue, which is relatively small. Do you have factual examples of “protection” and “significant security deployment” in “normal time” in this or similar type of venue? I would guess you do not.

As for one of the “most famous concert rooms in Moscow”, it definitely isn’t. Eric Clapton and Joe Cooker played there once (separately, of course). It’s a fairly marginal venue from what I could find and, again, it’s not even in Moscow per se. Not that it is really important though.

I am also amazed at your level of knowledge of the internal affairs in Russia, Fred. Deep knowledge. This is especially amazing since almost every source you provide in your posts is Ukrinform, one of the biggest Ukrainian propaganda sites out there.

Here is another thought to consider. Why would Russia blame Ukraine for this particular unfortunate event? Well, first of all, it is convenient and aligns with the current “struggles”. Maybe more importantly, however, you can link it to the SBU and, by extension, the CIA and MI5 and the like, and, all of a sudden, the failure by the appropriate Russian agencies doesn’t look as bad as it would if they failed to prevent an attack by four individuals with intelligence equivalent to an apricot, combined or otherwise (I think I said a pineapple in my previous post, but let’s make it more realistic). Wouldn’t you agree? While one is planned by a “man in a cave”, the other is planned by a bunch of very competent folks. The pick would be obvious for anyone with an ability to suppress information.

Anyway, this discussion has run out of substance, in my opinion, and there is not much anyone can say in order to change the direction at this point.

 

[Fredled]

@KipPotapych The Crocus arena is one of the most famous concert hall in Russia and beyond. 6000 people attended the concert. While not massive, it was probably one of the largest and most famous event in Moscow for a while.
Knowing a little bit Russia, there would be always a few police cars, in normal times, just to take care of troublemakers. There are very few troublemakers in Russia compared to some west Europe countries, but the number of policemen dispatched is proportionally twice as many. I imagine that in war time and after a terrorist warning, there would be at least an anti terrorist team ready nearby and increased security. Nope.
This is very strange for Russia.

It reminds me the shooting at the Bataclan concert hall in Paris (forgot the year) in the context of rampant Islamo terrorism at that time. There was a military patrol in the street when it happened and police came immediately but the first policemen didn't have the weapons needed. The soldiers, supposed to counter terrorist attacks were not allowed to enter the building to try to stop the bloodshed by the order that was given to them. Their order was to secure the perimeter in such a case. It makes sens from a military technical point, but many people died as a result.

AFAIK I didn't link any source from Ukrinform about this topic. Anyway, all your sources are Russian ones. So what's the difference?

 

[seaspear]

Perhaps some balance here , there was a school shooting in America where the responding police did not go into the building this article goes into the lack of protocols as a cause for the police inaction , certainly ordinarily armed police are not equipped to take on heavily armed terrorists ,I'm not sure if anyone here would suggest that police rush in with their pistols and no ppe

Law enforcement response to Uvalde school shooting was a 'failure,' DOJ says

An investigation into the 2022 shooting at Robb Elementary School in Texas indicated some children who were killed may have survived had officers followed active shooter protocols.

www.nbcnews.com

 

[John Fedup]

Perhaps some balance here , there was a school shooting in America where the responding police did not go into the building this article goes into the lack of protocols as a cause for the police inaction , certainly ordinarily armed police are not equipped to take on heavily armed terrorists ,I'm not sure if anyone here would suggest that police rush in with their pistols and no ppe

Law enforcement response to Uvalde school shooting was a 'failure,' DOJ says

An investigation into the 2022 shooting at Robb Elementary School in Texas indicated some children who were killed may have survived had officers followed active shooter protocols.

www.nbcnews.com

I believe the current recommendation for US police forces in active shooter situations is to immediately take down the shooter as quickly as possible. This recommendation is based on the analysis of numerous mass shootings in the US. The Uvalde police (and other law enforcement at the scene) didn't follow the recommendation. Most shootings in the US are by lone wack-job shooters, not political terrorists. Given the easy access to guns in the US, I am not sure how heavily armed is defined.

 

[seaspear]

There can be a big difference between recommendations and policies and procedures with training scenarios ,this document goes into some detail of collated information

https://www.secretservice.gov/sites/default/files/2020-04/Protecting_Americas_Schools.pdf

This earlier report is more sobering ,there is more I could add with training but I believe this would be going off the thread of this forum

Reports about police actions in U.S. mass shootings lack standardization and often leave unanswered questions

A lack of national standards leads to wide variability in after-action examinations of law enforcement’s response, ProPublica, The Texas Tribune and FRONTLINE found.

www.texastribune.org

 

[John Fedup]

There can be a big difference between recommendations and policies and procedures with training scenarios ,this document goes into some detail of collated information

https://www.secretservice.gov/sites/default/files/2020-04/Protecting_Americas_Schools.pdf

This earlier report is more sobering ,there is more I could add with training but I believe this would be going off the thread of this forum

Reports about police actions in U.S. mass shootings lack standardization and often leave unanswered questions

A lack of national standards leads to wide variability in after-action examinations of law enforcement’s response, ProPublica, The Texas Tribune and FRONTLINE found.

www.texastribune.org

Agree, OT. I will just repeat that killing the shooter as quickly as possible really is the best option. Also, the US access to hand and assault gun weapons along with huge magazines is really the elephant in the room wrt this issue. Nuff said…

 

[Fredled]

Agree, OT. I will just repeat that killing the shooter as quickly as possible really is the best option. Also, the US access to hand and assault gun weapons along with huge magazines is really the elephant in the room wrt this issue. Nuff said…

In the case of the Bataclan terrorist attack in Paris, it was clearly a failure in the protocol that was the cause of the inaction, not by police, but by military personnel who had the weapons required for this job. Policemen wouldn't try to go there with just a postol. At some point, a policeman asked a soldier to give his FALL rifle (french equivalent to the M16). The latter refused. They lost several minutes before anti-terrprost units came.

I believe that police officers are instructed not to engage a shooting if their weapon is not on par or superior to the murderer's weapon. The french policeman certainly had a handgun, but wouldn't go inside without something more powerful.

In the case of the US school shooting, the policeman was likely afraid to engage.

In the case of the Crocus concert zahl, policemen, if there were any, should have had, proactively, at least AK47 with them.

 

[Redshift]

In the case of the Bataclan terrorist attack in Paris, it was clearly a failure in the protocol that was the cause of the inaction, not by police, but by military personnel who had the weapons required for this job. Policemen wouldn't try to go there with just a postol. At some point, a policeman asked a soldier to give his FALL rifle (french equivalent to the M16). The latter refused. They lost several minutes before anti-terrprost units came.

I believe that police officers are instructed not to engage a shooting if their weapon is not on par or superior to the murderer's weapon. The french policeman certainly had a handgun, but wouldn't go inside without something more powerful.

In the case of the US school shooting, the policeman was likely afraid to engage.

In the case of the Crocus concert zahl, policemen, if there were any, should have had, proactively, at least AK47 with them.

Is the AK47 still in official Russian service?

 

[seaspear]

Not all French police wear protective vests it can depend on the district ballistic vests are not all the same most are multi purpose as part of a uniform and a lower level of protection. In Victoria Australia they were introduced because of six million dollars a year in workcover bills for injuries because of where the equipment was worn on the body e.g. a firearm on the hip will cause the spine to be out of alignment when sitting in a police car and if handcuffs were worn on other rear hip more problems ,the addition of the firearm worn on thigh and other equipment added to the front addressed these issues ,they often have the option of an up armour heavier vest in the car for serious response ,it was an interesting ergonomic report .

This bullet-riddled shield was used by police in the Bataclan rescue in Paris

The shield was struck by at least 17 bullets.

metro.co.uk

 

[Feanor]

Is the AK47 still in official Russian service?

AK-47s are still definitely in service, though I don't think regular police carry them or the AKSU like they used to. A SOBR can carry mostly whatever it wants when it comes to small arms.

 

[KipPotapych]

@KipPotapych The Crocus arena is one of the most famous concert hall in Russia and beyond. 6000 people attended the concert. While not massive, it was probably one of the largest and most famous event in Moscow for a while.
Knowing a little bit Russia, there would be always a few police cars, in normal times, just to take care of troublemakers. There are very few troublemakers in Russia compared to some west Europe countries, but the number of policemen dispatched is proportionally twice as many. I imagine that in war time and after a terrorist warning, there would be at least an anti terrorist team ready nearby and increased security. Nope.
This is very strange for Russia.

It reminds me the shooting at the Bataclan concert hall in Paris (forgot the year) in the context of rampant Islamo terrorism at that time. There was a military patrol in the street when it happened and police came immediately but the first policemen didn't have the weapons needed. The soldiers, supposed to counter terrorist attacks were not allowed to enter the building to try to stop the bloodshed by the order that was given to them. Their order was to secure the perimeter in such a case. It makes sens from a military technical point, but many people died as a result.

AFAIK I didn't link any source from Ukrinform about this topic. Anyway, all your sources are Russian ones. So what's the difference?

I respectfully disagree on the first part, but I said about as much as I am willing to on the subject. Also, it doesn’t matter because you are quite confident that you are right. Others are, for whatever reason, convinced that it is strange that there was no armed personnel/police present and how long it took for the police and special units to respond, while not one of those people would likely be able to say what the timeline was and probably have very little idea of what is normal and not in Russia to begin with. And so on. I, like I already said earlier, followed it live on the Russian news (live feed, I guess you can call it?) and think the police arrived quite quickly. A couple of sources I followed it from didn’t disagree and provided the (live) timeline later repeated (close enough) by the authorities. But none of it matters to some/most/all (?) of the people. And that is completely fine. I have no interest in convincing anyone of anything.

Last thing I will say on the venue and the size of the event. I just looked at the concert schedule in Moscow (obviously on a Russian site) and the first two I saw were at the CSKA Arena and Megasport, both of which are at least twice as big and both concerts are happening on April 20 simultaneously. There is another one at the CSKA Arena on April 13 (Hans Zimmer) and likely many more before and after (I didn’t look). The Megasport arena has a big figure skating event on April 12 and another concert on the 27 and probably many more in between and after (again, only saw what it showed to me). This alone suggests that the event wasn’t one of the largest and most famous in a while. This is a daily occurrence. There are also venues with capacity of well over 40,000 people (I can think of at least one, but do not recall the name at the moment). There are certainly dance clubs that have capacity of over 5,000 people. There are also sport events happening. For example, there are currently play offs in the KHL (the major “Russian” hockey league), that attract more than 6,000 people. After all, we are talking about Moscow here. It’s a huge market. One of the biggest on the European continent. 6,000 people is a fairly marginal event. Without any proof (except for the concert schedule cited above), I would suggest that there are several of these may very well be happening at the same time in different parts of the huge city, along side of other smaller and larger events. Sorry Fred, it just doesn’t appear that what you say is very reasonable, in my opinion (and at least some of your info contradicts the facts, as I illustrated above). I have zero invested in this and don’t particularly care what anyone thinks and not interested in proving anything, but the discussion and information sharing can be good. I think I provided some good and useful insights based on facts, as well as provided my opinion (based on facts and experience of dealing with such facts, as well as following news from the post-Soviet space, mainly Ukraine and Russia, for decades, on daily basis).

In regard to sources - I laughed. Thanks for that, haha. However, if you go back and review your own last 10 (or all?) posts that contain external references you will find… I would say with a fair degree of certainty that 8-9 out of ten would have only links Ukrinform. Often enough, there are no links at all, but the information is still clearly coming from (likely Ukrainian) propaganda outlets. On the other hand, I would encourage you to go over my last ten (or all?) posts that contain external references. I would say with about the same degree of certainty that likely at least 8 out of ten will have no Russian sources provided; and those that do mention such outlets have a particular purpose (which isn’t to spread some propaganda). I already discussed it here previously, but I will do another such exercise and use the examples from my previous post, as well as this one, to illustrate the difference.

First, this post. Above, I provided a link to some Russian site, which was the first search result Google shot at me (and it is obvious why that was the case due to the site being Yandex and minutes ago was the first time I have ever searched for concerts taking place in Russia and Moscow in particular - I otherwise have no interest in the subject). Would one expect a western source for this? Of course not. Is the Yandex site reliable and unbiased about the subject? Yes, of course it is - it is a schedule of events and you can probably buy tickets for any of those events, maybe even using that same site (I didn’t pay attention). This is a reasonable citation and, even more so, logical source to provide to support my claim.

Now, my previous post (note, we are talking about posts that cite external sources). I counted 5 references there: 3 were from the Russian media, one was Wikipedia, and one was from the Russian US embassy website. The first reference was to a Kommersant article from a few years ago about the sentencing of some individuals that were responsible for the devastating outcomes to the event I discussed. Is it factual? You bet - there were court proceedings and people mentioned in the article were sentenced to long years in prison, exactly like the article outlines. Would one expect a citation from a western source given the subject? Of course not - hardly anyone in the west knows or cares (generally speaking) for there to be an article (and maybe even there is one or a few somewhere, I do not know). The second source referenced was a Wikipedia page (only provided for convenience of others), which isn’t quite reliable, but the subject matter wasn’t important enough to do any better. Moreover, the page discusses the events that took place with a fair/sufficient degree of accuracy to illustrate that there is nothing unusual to have locked emergency exits and other major safety code violations in Russia; the page was cited in response to another member (conveniently, the article also talks about the conspiracy and doubt, etc, related to the event). I could find Russian sources (maybe (?) some western as well) that could provide a better picture, but the Wikipedia page was sufficient for illustration purposes. Hence, it was a reasonable reference in the circumstances. I would use other sources if I was writing a paper on the subject and those sources would most certainly be Russian for the most part. The next citation provided by me was from another Russian outlet called Meduza (probably in the official Russian list of “foreign agents”, not sure). I don’t even know if all information they provided is factual. For example, they report that the band said the event was sold out and the venue capacity is 6,200, hence there may have been 6,200 people present. The only relevant piece to my post was the venue capacity of 6,200 people, which is true (I checked). The rest is speculation - we don’t know if the event was sold out (in spite of the band’s claims), we don’t know if it was meant to be a full-venue event, etc. However, none of that is relevant. My point was illustrated with factual information, being that even at full capacity and so on -> reasonable and bias is irrelevant, if there is any. The next link was for the US Embassy, so nothing to say there. The last citation was a Lenta (another Russian outlet) article providing quotes from the official statement from the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), outlining timing, refuting the conspiracies, etc. That was provided for information others would not likely see and followed by my personal observation: there was nothing in what was said contradicting what I observed stated earlier. I also mentioned that what was said could be believed or ignored completely, largely because it is not necessarily relevant due to the sufficient (for me) amount of evidence that there was nothing extraordinary or intentional/suspicious, as suggested, in the way these unfortunate things had happened. Hence, the reference was relevant.

So no, not all my sources are Russian (far from it, actually). When I cite a Russian outlet, and I don’t do it that often, it is done so for a reason. If, on the other hand, I submit a post claiming “The Ukrainian government sent four terrorists that massacred 143 people on the outskirts of Moscow”, while providing links to the RIA Novosti as the reference for my claims, I wouldn’t take my own posts seriously.