Category: Russia

Hello,

Today we promised to show the real Israel! So for today and tomorrow, we are going to show pictures that you would see just driving around Israel…..

Tomorrow more pictures of Israel….

Kyle & Svet

comments always welcome.

Hello,

I was drinking my delicious morning cup of coffee and thinking that Moscow does play chess and Washington D.C. plays checkers……

The US has described as “disappointing” Russia’s plans to deploy new missiles in the Baltic region to counter a US defence shield in central Europe.

The message from the Kremlin is also clear: if the US wants good relations with Moscow then the new administration had better start by junking George Bush’s foreign policy.

A growing number of European politicians are voicing fears over the U.S. deployment of a missile shield all across the continent. More than 50 British MPs have called for a public debate into an issue which many fear could result in a new global arms race.

Kremlin plans to deploy missiles in the western Russian territory of Kaliningrad have sparked criticism in the West and led to fear of a new arms race. President Dmitry Medvedev said the move was a response to the proposed U.S. missile shield in eastern Europe.

Just hours after U.S. President-elect Barack Obama delivered his victory speech, Russia’s leader delivered a scathing rebuke of U.S. policy and reminded Obama of some of the major foreign policy challenges he will face in office.

Looks like Medvedev just made a move and Checked the missile issue: Is he bluffing or not?

Iskander (NATO reporting name SS-26 Stone) is a short range, solid fuel propelled, theater quasi-ballistic missile system produced in Russia.

I myself think he is very serious and the world should take Russia seriously and quit looking down their noses at Russia……..

Kyle & Svet

comments always welcome.

PS: Update on the Russian Missile issue! Looks like they are serious…

Anti-Missile Defense
// In Kaliningrad and Kozelsk
A simple response to American missile defense
Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of Russia Dmitry Medvedev yesterday declared his weightiest response yet to the U.S. missile defense system in Europe. Iskander-M tactical ballistic missiles will be placed in Kaliningrad Region. In addition, the president canceled the reformation of three regiments of the 28th (Kozelsk) Guard Missile Division of the Strategic Missile Forces.
The placement of Iskanders in a special district of Kaliningrad Region was announced in July of last year by First Deputy Prime Minister Sergey Ivanov. The missiles will be able to reach practically any point in Poland, where ten American antimissile missiles will be placed. At the beginning of this year, the 152nd missile brigade was scheduled to be refitted with Iskanders and relocated outside Chernyakhovsk, Kaliningrad Region. The press service of the infantry forces told Kommersant that the time of the relocation and the number of Iskanders is not public information.

The mobile Iskander-M (NATO classification SS-26Stone) is intended to hit objects on land deep within the opponent’s battle order. Two missiles are mounted on a single 9P78 launcher. They have a range of 50-280 km. and a payload mass of 480 kg. They can bear cassette, penetrating and blast-fragmentation warheads.

It was announced in 2007 that five missile brigades would be equipped with Iskander-M complexes by 2015. Only one division is known to have Iskanders in its arsenal (two squadrons with two Iskander complexes each). Alexander Khramchikhin, head of the analytical department of the Institute for Political and Military Analysis, said “the Iskanders in Kaliningrad Region will be the first target for a potential opponent and so their relocation will certain entail the strengthening of all groups of forces in the area.” The forces in the Kaliningrad special district (including Air Force, Air Defense and Navy forces) number around 100,000 people.

Reformation of the 28th Missile Division (Kozelsk, Kaluga Region) began last year. It has five missile regiments with a total of 46 silo launchers for RS-18 intercontinental ballistic missiles (NATO classification SS-19Stiletto). They have a range of over 10,000 km., a starting mass of 105.6 kg., length 24 m., diameter 2.5 m., two phases, separable warhead, and up to six nuclear charges.

Gen. Col. Leonid Ivashov, president of the Academy of Geopolitical Sciences, said “The RS-18 are obsolete complexes that have exceeded their operational life. They were produced and were in service at the end of the 1970s and beginning of the 1980s. Soon they will become a danger not to the opponent, but to us.” One circumstance seems to have led to the president’s decision to preserve the 28th Missile Division. Thirty RS-18 missiles were bought by Russia from Ukraine in 2003, where they had been stored disassembled. Therefore, at present they can be considered “new” and placed in service until 2030. Editor-in-chief of the Moscow Defense Brief Mikhail Barabanov said that “assembly work and fine tuning of the missiles has been going on for a long time. The president simply indicated where to put them.”
by Ivan Konovalov

Gambling Paradise all over Kiev!

My Hotel!

Bird Bush!

What a Sunset!

Monastery!

Hello,

I have been in Kiev, Ukraine about 6 times. I have traveled from one end of the city and back. Its Metro is about a quarter of the size (or less) of the Moscow Metro, which made it very easy to transverse and see the whole city in a matter of a week. This time in Kiev I was alone and was very bored. So I walked, walked, walked and walked. I also watched TV and that is something I do not do in Moscow.

I came to a realization that Kiev is a Soviet City. From the old cobble stone roads in the heart of Kiev to the statues and water fountains everywhere. When you walk downtown Kiev the building architecture is coordinately Soviet style.

I also came to the realization that Kiev wants to shed its Soviet background. The new building structures going up on the outskirts of Kiev are classic modern.(Lots of Glass!) They have many newspapers in English. Many more people speak English in Kiev than in Moscow. Every McDonald’s the teenage workers all spoke English if you asked. They have lots of English speaking TV stations. They are very anti Russian, while very pro American on TV.

I guess that I am an old fogy because I like the style and feel of the Soviet era. I like the grandness and powerful building structure from the Soviet era. The heart of Kiev was a good place to walk and had many surprises to delight the eyes. The very center of Kiev is one huge cobble stone crossroads. These crossroads are still guided by traffic cops and the traffic flowed smoothly.

The Metro is Soviet era and looks many times like you are traveling in the Moscow Metro. Also the stations are very deep in Kiev. (Very deep.)

I see a city that is struggling with its past and future. That is the beauty of the Soviet past but the wannabe of a western future.

I will say that Kiev is no Moscow! But Kiev is a beautiful city and I myself find that Kiev, Ukraine has always been good to me.

Kyle

comments always welcome.

Hello.

On our trip we first stopped in Tel-Aviv, Israel. These are some pictures of Tel-Aviv. Tel-Aviv is just like any major city in the world. You can find everything and anything.

Impression of Tel-Aviv: Very very heavy Military presence, lots of poverty, high crime, beggars everywhere, huge drug problems and lots of American companies. (The rest of Israel is different than Tel-Aviv))

Tomorrow we have pictures of the (real) Israel. We rented a car so we got to travel all over the country. 🙂

Kyle & Svet

comments always welcome.

Hello,

Yesterday I gave a small run down on visa issues and how you do not want to go to Israel and try to get a Russian Visa!

Today as promised, I am going to show you a couple of friends that we meet over the internet in the world of blogging. They ended up being the best reason to go to Israel and we are glad that we did, even though it took about two weeks longer to get the visa. This is Chelita and Misha her Husband. Chelita has a blog Былое и думы! This is where I stole these pictures from. She has already posted pictures from our visit on her blog.

Chelita and Misha are a couple of the most fantastic people Svet and I have ever met. They are like saints in disguise. Cheltia cooked some of the most delicious food we have ever had and Misha was the most pleasant host anyone could be.

They would not let us stay at a hotel and insisted that we stay with them the whole time in Israel. So we set up base at their flat and had a fantastic time.

Svet and I want to thank Chelita and Misha for the vacation of a life time. We have promised to go back and we will…..

Kyle & Svet

comments always welcome.

MOSCOW, November 3 (RIA Novosti) – Joseph Alliluyev, the son of Joseph Stalin’s daughter Svetlana, died in Moscow on Sunday.

Alliluyev, born in 1945, was the only grandson of Stalin to have met the Soviet dictator. He worked as a cardiologist, and published over 150 papers on heart disease.

He kept a low profile throughout his life, never giving interviews.

Svetlana Alliluyeva, aged 82, Stalin’s only daughter, defected to the United States in 1967 and has U.S. citizenship.

Not just a few people!

Hello,

While drinking a cup of coffee, I was thinking about the huge demonstration that was held in Moscow on the 2nd of November.

More than 20,000 activists of Nashi Movement held an action of protest in front of the US Embassy in Moscow on November 2, 2008.

Nashi affirm that endless wars that have been rattling the world during the latest decades, the world financial crisis, which bankrupts whole countries, the long-lasting and pompous ceremony of the “democratic election” in the USA are all linked with each other into the never-ending American show. The world has to pay a big price for these festivities: thousands have been murdered, millions and billions of innocent people live in misery, whereas immoral politicians cash in on their grief. Tens of wars have been organized throughout the world, with the latest one of them, the war in South Ossetia, having taken about 2,000 human lives.

After a month of traveling away from Moscow and Russia. I got to see how other countries think and how they feel about America. The feelings are mutual between countries. America is loosing that edge of being the shining spot in the world…..

Kyle & Svet

comments always welcome.

Tanks blown up still sitting everywhere on the sides of the roads!

Hello,

We are back together again and life is resettling down to the normal pace. I have lots to catch up on and tons of stuff to unpack. But I thought that I would take a moment and post a article today.

I want to thank all who commented to the blog over my absence and to thank my readership. It has grown by a third in the time we were gone. (Maybe I need to leave more often!) 🙂

So: To start the adventure, Svet and I made a Russian visa run to Israel. We called the Embassy and Consulate of Russia in Israel, no less than 30 times to verify everything. We even made an appointment (mandatory) to get the visa. We made sure of everything that was necessary to get a Russian visa for me in Israel! Or so we thought….

We flew into Israel and stepped off the jet into a blast furnace. It was hot compared to Moscow. We had a hotel reserved for a few days in Tel-Aviv. This was for the time that we should have gotten a visa. We spent 4 days not getting a visa: The reason was very simple. They wanted a huge bribe. Not just a bribe, not just a token of appreciation or gift to help life along. They wanted a bribe to be able to buy their Girlfriends new Diamonds! They wanted a bribe to buy all their kids a new car!

There also was not even: a long wait and legal way to get the Russian visa. It was bribe or nothing……

Guess what? We – to their astonishment said: “You get, nothing!”

So we had our vacation anyway in Israel. I knew that I could go to Russian Ukraine Consulate and get my visa and have always in the past gone to Ukraine. Looks like I keep going to Ukraine….

Tomorrow we will post about the Israel vacation and I will say it was a blast. We made new friends who wish us back at anytime. We have never had perfectly strange people treat us like family before. They made a bad visa trip transform into a fantastic travel trip.

I will be talking about them in tomorrows article.

Kyle & Svet

comments always welcome.

Hello,

The 1st of November I crossed the border from Ukraine to Russia. I am now at home with my Sweetie and dog, Yippy!!!!

Starting tomorrow, 2nd of November. We will resume normal posts on all the blogs. We have lots of pictures and stories to tell.

Right now I am going to sleep.

Kyle & Svet