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A couple of weeks back I wrote a post on my other blog called The SMO Is Done in which I said this:
“Russia has a choice. Fight a real war, or surrender on the least humiliating terms it can get.”
At that time I had no expectation that Putin would choose to fight a real war; and I still do not believe that, left to his own devices, he would want to fight one. However, the refernda being organised by the Lugansk and Donetsk People’s Republics and the Kherson and Zaporozhye Oblasts on accession to Russia leave him no choice (and were precisely designed, I believe, to force his hand). That is why he has belatedly announced a partial mobilisation (of 300000 troops, to which you can add at least 60-70000 battle hardened and motivated LNR and DNR soldiers) and all indicators are that he will finally fight for real.
At least we can hope.
As for the Ukranazis, this is something else I said:
(Ukrainian commander) “Zaluzhny is throwing” (disposable) “conscripts and” (a liability) “Kraken Battalion Nazis (the Kharkov franchise of the infamous Azov Regiment) into attack as shock troops, and holding back his regular forces to exploit the breakthroughs.”
And, yes, the nazis are so overtly nazi now that they’ve taken to painting WWII Wehrmacht crosses on their vehicles as recognition insignia. They are doing that.
Cartooning shall resume from this point onwards. Unless Putin betrays us again.
Raghead The Fiendly Neighbourhood Terrorist 
Glad you are feeling a little less disheartened.
Putin sent in a small force, and they seemed to be slowly but surely progressing. But it turned out they were far too spread out and could not hold all the lands they nominally had, and so retreated from Kharkov very quickly as the Ukraine approached, leaving a lot of munitions behind that they did not have time to take. Not at all clear what really happened.
But Putin seems to be reversing now, more troops, better weapons, more aggressive action against the Ukrainians.
As best I can tell, Putin was trying to minimise damage to the Ukraine, but his minimising Russian damage allowed maximal A3OB damage. So now Russia will be damaging a lot more Ukrainian infrastructure. And once the Donbass vote to become part of Russia, the counterattacks will be even fiercer.
At least one can hope.
The US must be defeated in the Ukraine and in Taiwan. The PRC threatened but then did nothing, because they are desperate to delay as long as possible, for obvious reasons (the PLA get stronger every year while the US military get weaker as more and more of their budget go to corruption). The US are desperate to provoke the PRC into a war before 2026, because the US are sure they will win any conflict before 2026, but not so sure after. And the PRC want to delay until after 2030, for similar reasons.