I do not have an anti-western bias.

I served in the Australian military.

I live in Israel which is close to the West but also has a very substantial (20%) population of Russians, Ukrainians and other people from the FSU. They know what is really going on from wide ranging personal contacts and this information feeds into Israeli public attitudes and government positions. That is why Israel is staying neutral.

Israel fought most of its wars against Russian weapons and knows how good they are.

Regarding what is happening on the ground right now:

1. on the one hand you have the catastrophic failure of the Ukrainian counteroffensive with embarrassing wholesale destruction of Western tanks and armoured vehicles;

2. on the other hand some more crazy theatrics which you have documented above.

In this war the West and Ukraine have consistently engaged in theatrical PR stunts while Russia has engaged in the real business of large scale industrial warfare.

It is increasingly acknowledged by serious military people in the West that Ukraine has lost unless some wild card happens.

I expect all sorts of attempts to create crazy wild cards and this Wagner thing is likely one of them.

At the end of the day when Germany admits it has only 20,000 155mm shells left and Russia fires 10,000 per day you realise that NATO has lost this war. The only remaining question is - how badly.