#access to the baltic

[lemayday]

get estonia'd

[renonv]

COMMUNITY. does. Anyone have good resources for historical clothing? I know there’s a huge western fashion doc floating around somewhere (I need to find it), but I would love to have access to like, non Eurocentric (or specifically western), historical clothing.

[thevagueambition]

people have begun validating prepper ideas in denmark out of fear of russia and i find it so absurd

even if they came here we would simply surrender immediately like we did during ww2 lmao

forget canned food and stock up on cream for the sahnefront revival!

[bakerstreetdoctor]

I'm still not over the reasons for the Great Northern war, I swear. Like Denmark... Yeah okay I kinda get it. Wanting to get Holstein-Gottorp under their thumb, maybe getting a taste of Scania returning to Denmark. But then Russia like "uhm when Tsar Peter was visiting Riga in incognito and acting as a servant he wasn't shown enough respect" REALLY (btw yeah that's the official reason given why they declared war)

August better should've focused on getting his Polish-Lithuanian affairs in order, that's all I'm gonna say about him

[myfavoritedemons]

Disco Academia

Open Access academic works written about Disco Elysium:

Urban Shivers: Recoding Actual Space in Disco Elysium (2022) by Arina R. Medvedeva

Baltic Screen Media Review Volume 9 (2021): Issue 1 (December 2021) - This entire issue is dedicated to works on DE, there are ten separate articles herein.

Not just Playing: Potential in Enhancing Second Language Learning through Games (2023) by Xiangyi Zhang

Screenshots as Photography in Gamescapes: An Annotated Psychogeography of Imaginary Places (2023) by Mafalda Gamboa et al.

Potentially paywalled articles, check if you have access through your local library or other sources.

The Voices of Game Worlds: A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Disco Elysium (2022) by Jens Kjeldgaard-Christiansen and Míša Hejná

Disco Pinball: Declining Games and Depression in Disco Elysium (2024) by Ryan Banfi

Our Bodies, Our Incoherent Selves: Games and Shifting Concepts of Identity and Narrative in Contemporary Storytelling (2018) by Julialicia Case

[sonyaheaneyauthor]

How Russian colonialism took the Western anti-imperialist Left for a ride

Blindness to Russian colonialism distorts Westerners’ view of the Ukraine war

"Fucking shit Russian car," my driver spat as a Lada sedan passed us on the highway from Georgia's capital of Tbilisi to Stepantsminda during my trip there in 2019, shortly after our long conversation touched on Russia's 2008 invasion of Georgia.

His momentary flash of anger was an eye-opening glimpse at the consequences of Russia's steadfast refusal to let go of the 14 nations whose independence following the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union dictator Vladimir Putin infamously called "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century" – not to mention the ethnic minorities still under Moscow's yoke – and its brutal punishment of Georgia and Ukraine for daring to seek a bright future outside of Russia's sunless orbit.

The full-scale invasion of Ukraine has cast a long-overdue spotlight on Russian imperialism and colonialism, yet many Westerners fail to grapple with how Russia's colonial legacy continues to this day and is part and parcel to its war against Ukraine and descent into fascism. Consequently, many end up whatabouting, excusing and even overtly sympathizing with an empire whose colonial practices mirror those of historical Western European empires in cruelty, chauvinism, thievery, exploitation, cultural erasure, racism and genocide and that is now ruthlessly attempting to conquer one of its neighbors.

Russia displayed that ruthlessness last week when it lobbed missiles at Odesa, damaging port and grain storage facilities as well as its historic center, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

"They're interested in lands and influence and a buffer zone between them and the West, in sea access – but not in people and not in culture," said Ukrainian Parliament adviser Yuliia Shaipova who, together with her husband, Aspen Institute NextGen Transatlantic Initiative member Artem Shaipov, was at home in Odesa after hiding in a nearby bomb shelter.

Yet, Westerners safe from bombardment like long-shot third-party presidential candidate Cornel West continue to accommodate Russia. In a July 13 interview with CNN's Kaitlan Collins, West called Russia's invasion "criminal" but insisted it was "provoked by the expansion of NATO" and is a "proxy war between the American Empire and the Russian Federation," adding Neville Chamberlain-esque icing on the appeasement cake by proposing Ukrainian territorial concessions to Russia.

The tell in West's remarks was calling the U.S. an empire but referring to Russia by its de jure name, implicitly erasing its imperial, colonial character. It's a common tendency among the segment of the left to which West belongs, one that Kazakhstan-born Pitzer College sociology professor Azamat Junisbai attributes to ignorance and a myopic, know-nothing focus on American imperialism to the exclusion of imperialism by other nations.

"They're kind of imperial about their anti-imperialism," Junisbai said. "There's something very provincial and strange about it where you literally do not know anything about what's happening beyond this one issue you care about."

While West and other leftists blame "NATO expansion" for provoking Russia, Junisbai compares NATO membership – which, after all, the former Warsaw Pact and Baltic countries all sought voluntarily – to a restraining order against an abusive partner.

"People don't recognize that there was an abusive relationship, that there was colonialism," he said, speculating that blindness to Russian colonialism could be due to a failure of Western education systems as well as Soviet propaganda and leftist valorization of the Soviet Union as a foe of Western imperialism. Another potential culprit is knee-jerk distrust toward American foreign policy popular among some leftists and alternative media that leads to a simplistic "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" worldview.

"People, I think, just get so wedded to their vision of themselves as fighting 'The Man,' fighting the power that they are blinded and taken for a ride by Russia, in this case serving as useful idiots," Junisbai said.

Both Yuliia and Artem Shaipov pointed the finger at academic studies of Russia in the West that view it through Moscow's imperial lens. The two have published articles advocating for a "decolonization" of Russia studies and greater attention to how veneration of the "great Russian culture" – such as the genocide- and conquest-glorifying literature of Mikhail Lermontov and Alexander Pushkin – has provided a conduit for Russian imperialist ideology to sneak into the Western mind.

"Part of the reason is that it's Western academia that kind of perpetuates this imperial understanding of our region that benefits Russia's imperial policies," Shaipov said, pointing to how Western academic institutions place Ukraine and other post-Soviet nations under Russia's geopolitical umbrella of "Eurasia." "It speaks volumes about the reasons why still many people in the West see Ukraine and other independent states as the sphere of influence of Russia."

The resulting sympathy for Russia's imperial worldview finds expression among Western academics, media personalities and activists who deny Ukrainians' agency in repeating the Kremlin conspiracy theory that Ukraine's 2014 Revolution of Dignity was a "U.S.-backed coup" – as if Ukrainians couldn't have removed outrageously corrupt Kremlin stooge Viktor Yanukovych from office after his security forces murdered over 100 peaceful protesters without foreigners pulling the strings – or characterize former communist nations' NATO membership as provoking Russia rather than protecting them from it.

And it's a mindset rooted in over 400 years of imperialism and colonialism that caused atrocities as horrific as those of Spain or Britain.

Russia's conquest of Siberia starting in the 1580s, for instance, included the enslavement of indigenous peoples whom it forced to pay tribute in the form of furs known as yasak on pain of death, resulting in starvation as people struggled to meet yasak quotas instead of feeding themselves in a system some historians have compared to Belgian King Leopold II's enslavement of the Congo. Russian Cossack gangs raped and murdered while Orthodox missionaries stamped out native religions and alcoholism and smallpox decimated local populations. Today, indigenous people in Siberia and the Russian Far East frequently live in poverty while Moscow strips their lands' rich natural resources to line the pockets of oligarchs and fuel the glitz of cities like Moscow and St. Petersburg, while their men disproportionately make up the cannon fodder that Russia sends to the Ukrainian front.

"If we take the Russia that is situated behind the Urals – the Central Asian part of Russia, the far East Asian parts of Russia, the [northernmost parts of Russia] – the cities are just being used for extractive purposes, so [the Russians] don't care even about their own people and minorities that are in Russia itself," Shaipova said, noting how nearly all of their enormous wealth goes to the Russian metropole. "So basically, take Norilsk or Irkutsk – those cities look like an atomic bomb has exploded there."

In the Caucasus, where Russia vied with the Ottoman and Persian empires for power, the Muslim Circassians, who had inhabited the area for millennia, resisted Russian domination. So in 1857, Tsar Alexander II ordered their expulsion to the Ottoman Empire under a proposal by Count Dmitri Milyutin, who said it would "cleanse the land of hostile elements" and open their farmland for Christian settlers. The result was the Circassian genocide in which nearly the entire Circassian population was killed or expelled to the Middle East, where most Circassians live today.

Junisbai's own life is a testament to Russia's thorough colonization of his country, which began in earnest in the 18th century after Russia conquered it. His mother tongue is Russian rather than Kazakh thanks to generations of Russification that made learning Russian essential to get ahead while casting indigenous languages by the wayside. That led to him being conditioned to look down on Kazakhs who could not speak Russian properly while growing up in Almaty, whose population during the Soviet era was about four-fifths Russian and had only two Kazakh-language schools in the early 1980s, while Kazakhs largely lived in rural areas. Meanwhile, his great-grandfather was a member of the Kazakh intelligentsia, for which the Soviets executed him at Omsk in 1935 during Stalin's purges. Consistent with Russia's pattern of extractive relationships with its colonies, Moscow picked Kazakhstan as the place to test nuclear weapons, Junisbai's mother growing up only a couple hundred miles from a testing site.

The 2022 invasion of Ukraine brought to the forefront the issues of language and Russian colonialism that Junisbai had been thinking about for a while. Today, he spells Kazakhstan's name as "Qazaqstan," reflecting the native pronunciation, rather than the more common Russian-based spelling.

"This invasion – just the scale of it and how blatantly imperialist it was – was a point of no return," he said, regarding how it got him thinking more about those issues. "Like how strange and horrible it is that I am stuck with Russian, and it's like having something stuck in my body, and I cannot remove it."

In contrast with its terrestrial empire building, Russia didn't have as much luck overseas, as its North American and Hawaiian colonies proved unsuccessful, along with its lesser-known attempt to partake in that most infamous example of European colonialism, the 19th-century Scramble for Africa.

Russia's covetousness toward Ukraine differs somewhat from its other colonization activities, but comes from the same underlying desire to subjugate. It stems from the popular myth that Russia is the legitimate heir to the medieval state of Kyivan Rus, centered on modern-day Kyiv, which Putin cited in a July 2021 pseudohistorical essay denying Ukraine's right to sovereignty, "On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians." But as Ukrainian historian Serhii Plokhy points out in his new book, "The Russo-Ukrainian War," although the Grand Principality of Moscow – later called Muscovy – derived much of its culture from Kyivan Rus, 15th-century ruler Ivan the Great invented the myth of Muscovy's inextricable link to it by declaring himself the sole legitimate heir to the Kyivan princes in order to justify his conquest of the Republic of Novgorod.

"The independent Russian state, born of the struggle between Moscow and Novgorod, resulted from the victory of authoritarianism over democracy," Plokhy writes.

Shaipov said Muscovy inherited its political culture not from Europe, but from the Mongol Empire of which it had long been a vassal.

"This is their political tradition of authoritarianism, oppression and continuous imperial conquest," he said.

Ukrainians learned that the hard way in the mid-1600s when Ukrainian Cossacks rebelled against their Catholic Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth rulers and established an independent state, seeking protection from their Orthodox co-religionists in Muscovy. But after helping them achieve victory, their Muscovite allies sought to dominate them, leading to another Ukrainian Cossack rebellion in 1708 that soon allied with Sweden. Muscovy defeated them at the Battle of Poltava in 1709, and in 1721, under Tsar Peter I, Muscovy became the Russian Empire.

In other words, Russian claims of lordship over Ukraine are about as credible as if British leaders called decolonization a "geopolitical catastrophe" and then dredged up medieval manuscripts to make the case against Irish independence.

The Russian Empire collapsed with the 1917 October Revolution, but that tradition of authoritarianism, oppression and imperial conquest persisted as the empire got a new coat of paint, trading tsars for commissars and rebranding as the U.S.S.R.

Numerous nations under Russian rule for centuries declared independence – including Ukraine as well as Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, the Tatar-led Idel-Ural State and others. But the Bolsheviks quickly invaded nearly all of them, forcing them into the newly established Soviet Union, which reoccupied the Baltic nations after World War II, leaving only Finland independent. In Ukraine, Stalin caused the Holodomor, a genocidal famine that depopulated most of the country's east, allowing its resettlement by Russians. In 1944, he accused indigenous Crimeans – for whom even the term "Crimean Tatars," Shaipov noted, is a misnomer with colonialist undertones – of collaborating with the Nazis and deported them all, allowing Russians to become a majority in Crimea too.

Those malign political traditions continued after 1991 as Russia crushed the fledgling Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and Tatarstan and sponsored pro-Russia breakaway states in Moldova's Transnistria region and the Georgian regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, where Russia used false accusations of genocide as a pretext for its 2008 invasion, a tactic it would rehash in Ukraine six years later.

And they live on today in Russia's nationalist, imperialist, bloodthirsty and downright genocidal "Z" propaganda for domestic audiences.

Even Russian liberals remain far from untainted. While Westerners lionize Alexei Navalny as a freedom fighter, Junisbai highlighted his history of racism toward Central Asians.

"Navalny is not really well-liked in Central Asia because he's the person who contributed to hate crimes against Central Asians in Russia," Junisbai explained, lamenting how many Westerners continue to see that part of Navalny's past as marginal.

Navalny also drew scorn for a series of tweets on July 25 in which he called Russian war criminal Igor Girkin a "political prisoner" following his arrest for criticizing Putin.

Shaipov and Shaipova pointed to how Jan Rachinsky, the head of Memorial, rejected the idea of Russian repentance for waging war against Ukraine in his Nobel Peace Prize lecture last year.

"This understanding of themselves as an empire is part of their national identity, and this is also what concerns the so-called Russian liberals," Shaipova said.

At the same time, Junisbai said people inside Russia consistently fail to acknowledge their nation's colonial history.

"The surest way to offend a Russian person is to talk about colonialism or Russians as colonizers," he said

Instead, Russians overwhelmingly view themselves – in true colonialist form – as having civilized Central Asians, believing they were illiterate before Russia introduced Cyrillic, despite Junisbai's grandfather having written in Arabic script, and that if not for Russia they would still be riding horses and living in yurts.

"It's just like, 'we built your schools, we built your hospitals – how dare you be disrespectful, how dare you not appreciate us,'" he said.

This lack of self-awareness stands in stark contrast with European nations that decolonized and, although in fits and starts, today seek to atone for past injustices. In 2021, Germany formally apologized for genocide in Namibia in the early 1900s, while Queen Camilla declined to wear a crown at King Charles' coronation bearing the Kohinoor diamond, which Britain plundered when it ruled India.

Shaipov and Shaipova said Russia must also undergo decolonization, a process the world should not fear.

"In order for them to heal, they need to go through this healing process and repentance so that they can reconcile with neighboring countries and with the peoples that populate the Russian Federation," Shaipov said.

But Russia must first remove the Harry Potter-like invisibility cloak that has long allowed its colonial legacy to go unnoticed.

"Once you tear it off, then people can see the horribleness – like, how could people side with an abuser and against someone who's trying to take out a restraining order against this abuse," Junisbai said.

[starstrike]

Free Disco Elysium papers

Disco Elysium is a profoundly thought-provoking game, and I’ve seen a lot of wonderful meta for it on here. Plus, video game studies is an incredibly interesting and rapidly evolving field! I think a lot of you would enjoy reading some published literature on the game! I’ve also seen people talk about how a lot of the online meta for the game comes without considering the Estonian context the game was made in. Guess what, there’s an open access journal for that! Baltic Screen Media Review did a special issue on Disco Elysium! You can find it here: https://sciendo.com/issue/BSMR/9/1 Some of these texts are... really dense, and not super approachable. I found myself checking out books from the library just to understand one (The Object Gives Rise to Thought: Hermeneutics of Objects in Disco Elysium; I liked it a lot! Having the lens of Disco Elysium to guide me let me understand the philosophical framework a lot better tbh). I haven’t read them all. Plenty of them have concepts in the titles I’ve never even heard of, especially because I don’t have much background in philosophy. But I learned a lot from them, and I’m excited to learn more. Have fun, everyone!

[scotianostra]

October 11th 1297 was the date of the letter from William Wallace to the mayor of Lübeck.

Today in 1297 a letter from Sir William Wallace and Sir Andrew Moray to the mayors of Lübeck and Hamburg was drawn up, saying that "The Kingdom of Scotland has, by God's Grace, recovered by battle from the power of the English".

This is a remarkable piece of history, and I am honoured to have seen it in person when it was on loan to Scotland a few years ago.

The Lübeck letter was first discovered preserved in the Lübeck archives in the 1820s. It was often mentioned in books thereafter. In 1942, Lübeck, on the Baltic coast of Germany, was attacked by Allied aircraft. As a result, the town's archives, including the letter, were moved to a saltmine for safety. At the end of the war, the Soviet army took the papers east. The archives were later handed over to the archive administration of East Germany, but the medieval documents were not among the records. It was assumed that they had been lost.

In the 1970s Lübeck documents were found in the archives of the USSR. In 1990, after some negotiation, the town's medieval records, including Wallace and Murray's letter, were returned to Lübeck.

There have been calls for the letter to be returned to Scotland, whereas it would be nice to have it to display in one of our museums I think it is as much a piece of Lübeck's history as ours, and also as recipients of the letter it is rightfully there property.

Originally, there were two letters; one to Lübeck and one to Hamburg. The contents were identical and the letters were scribed within a month of the Scots’ success at Stirling Bridge.

The translated letter reads......

"Andrew de Murray and William Wallace, leaders of the army of the kingdom of Scotland, and the community of the same kingdom, to their worthy, discreet and beloved friends the mayors and communes of Lübeck and Hamburg, greeting, and increase always of sincere friendship.

It has been intimated to us by trustworthy merchants of the said kingdom of Scotland that you by your own goodwill are giving counsel, help and favour in all causes and business concerning us and our merchants, although our merits had not deserved this, and therefore all the more are we bound to you to give you thanks and a worthy recompense, to do which we are willing to be obliged to you; and we ask you that you will make it be proclaimed amongst your merchants that they can have secure access to all ports of the kingdom of Scotland with their merchandise since the kingdom of Scotland, thanks be to God, has by arms been recovered from the power of the English. Farewell.

Given at Haddington in Scotland on the 11th day of October in the year of grace one thousand two hundred and ninety seven.

We request moreover that you will see fit to forward the business of John Burnet and John Frere, our merchants, just as you wish us to forward the business of your merchants. Farewell. Given as before."

Significantly, the letter carries the only known impression of William Wallace's personal seal, which shows the Scottish Lion Rampant on the front and on the reverse, a strung bow with a protruding arrow. The inscription appears to read ‘William, son of Alan Wallace’, which is interesting in relation to determining just who Wallace was exactly. An Aleyn Waleys – described as ‘tenant le Roi du counte de Are’ – signed the 1296 ‘Ragman Roll’ and he is quite possibly William Wallace’s father.

Another thing about the letter is the fact that Moray is involved with it, Andrew de Moray was, in the North of Scotland every bit as important as Wallace, history tells us that he was wounded at Stirling Bridge and died of his wounds in November so how involved in this was he?, if I had a time machine I would use it to learn more about Wallace and Moray.

This is a great piece of history and as I said earlier, I would love it to be part of our archives and on display in a museum, but it is the property of the people of Lübeck and we as a nation are grateful that they lend it to us on occasion.

[lifenconcepts]

Barnacles headcanons! (There’s a lot)

Is likely a dawn/dusk person, and while everyone are still unsure wether they’re conscious and are tucked away in the rooms he probably enjoys to go out and enjoy to first and last rays of sunshine, takes in the peace and calm of the pod as he does one final patrol, and with a smile on his face begins or ends the day.

Likely needs glasses but doesn’t admit it over a fear for being seen as less of a person over that and as if he isn’t worth of being a leader, and so he never wears them unless he’s 100% sure he’s alone. Also likely worries if his octowatch breaks due to using it as an aid in case his vision fails him.

Strength > stamina. Pure brute force and sprint more preferable to constant force or jogs, and likely has more endurance in short bursts of energy vs using it on a spread out course.

Probably gives physical affirmation to his crew through shoulder or head pats. 

Has a list of phrases to say for each member of the crew to make them feel the most loved, had figured out what makes the best effect and jotted them down secretly.

Likely has some Siberian/Russian blood in him somewhere and so (if humanised..) his features resemble Slavic/Baltic faces somewhat.

Forgets basic bodily necessities to the point of being a danger to himself at times, being able to stay focused on more important things at hand and ignore any signals that his body is hurt or deteriorating until he practically collapses.

Is a picky eater.

Loves to do that breathing thing in the cold and watch a cloud of icy air escape his mouth.

Secretly loves cold ‘hot’ cocoa and tends to leave it around to cool down before drinking it.

Forgetful when it comes to keeping track of past memories and likely keeps a journal full or whatever information he finds important (stuff he must do, the adventures they went on, new information he studied, resources they gathered, moments he had with the crew, and the sorts).

When tired tends to elongate his M-s and N-s far more than average goobers.

Has accidentally purred before.

Receives gifts from the crew from time to time and treats it like the most important piece of equipment the world has ever seen.

Occasionally gets nightmares/night terrors.

Tends to read any brochure or information booklet he receives, often focusing his attention on things that hold practically no real purpose other than to fill space.

Tends to do things ‘by the book’ but has an open mind and insists that others find their way of doing things that works for them, encouraging them to try out new tactics and trust their gut.

Very skiddish when it comes to intimacy.

Touch starved but doesn’t mind that, dislikes anything more than a quick hug or pat on the shoulder, any longer and he becomes rather uncomfortable.

Whenever he gets hiccups he genuinely gets embarrassed enough to hide from the crew.

Quite private about his past experiences but very open about his feelings, being able to engage in a heart to heart conversation with those he trusts.

Despite facing conflicts head-on, he usually avoids actual conflict by escaping a situation - if feeling threatened, would rather leave the room than do anything. But does stand up for himself when necessary but usually prioritises others before him. If others aren’t in immediate or potential danger, he would usually just exit the room to not have anyone get riled up. 

Has many books he thought he’d be interested in but never gets past the first few pages and has to re-read them over and over since he takes such long breaks that he forgets all that he previously read.

Likes to stick his tongue out when it snows and eat the snowflakes.

Whenever he feels a bit lonely he listens to The Smiths (usually only when alone).

Has a bunch of different cds and a cd player despite having full access to modern technology that can cram it all into one tiny gadget. Tweak has tried to get him to change what he used, especially for some of his musical records being quite damaged, but he refuses as it gives him a sense of comfort and a strange sense of satisfaction - even when the music is all rumbly.

Sometimes worries that the windows to then octopod or gups may collapse under pressure of the water and gets increasingly tense when near one as the water is unsettled.

Loves to cuddle up in a thick warm blanket until he overheats and has to kick it off, then ends up pulling it back again for that comforting feeling until he’s too warm again and is stuck in limbo of either being pleasantly cold but no blanket or cozy soft blanket but too hot.

Occasionally blows air onto his paws just to see the fur move, as it gives an oddly calming effect on him.

Has helped build a few things around the octopod and always leaves a little touch of his own, wether it be putting a paw print on his finished product or indenting a little design with his claws.

Doesn’t like to scold his crew but sometimes has to so they understand what lesson he’s trying to teach, despite that, tends to try find the softer way to get a thought across and express what he needs of the team.

Sometimes growls to stim, but tends to only do it when alone as to not scare anyone.

Likes the texture of jello!

Is incredibly supportive to whatever his beloved friends and teammates identify as, and abides by their preferred pronouns and name.

Rarely asks for help, if at all, and has learn the hard way how to get out of some incredibly inconvenient and dangerous situations you would probably never even be in if it weren’t for overconfidence and desire to protect the beloved crew.

Is wildly unsure of how to react in romantic situations and often gets uncomfortable enough to announce his leaving and absolutely skiddadle out the scenes.

Loved animated movies as a child but grew up to enjoy drama and historical films.

Takes his dental hygiene very seriously.

Occasionally joins the crew to make silly little paper crafts and sometimes makes collages out of different colours to create landscapes he saw.

P.S I won’t be making any age/sexuality/show related headcanons but rather stuff that fits their personality. ALSO THEY ALL HAVE AUTISM. ALSO THEY ALL HUM TUNES.

Source? I said so. I am litterally going off nothing from the show apart from the vibe :3

[tifoti]

A cabin on board the Aachen, a 19th-century steamship hit by a torpedo in July 1915. Now located at the bottom of the Baltic Sea.

The Aachen was a 19th-century steamship that met a tragic end when it was struck by a torpedo in July 1915. The ship was sailing in the Baltic Sea when it was targeted and sunk, taking with it the lives of many of its passengers and crew.

Today, the remains of the Aachen lie at the bottom of the Baltic Sea, a silent witness to the devastation of war. The ship has become a popular destination for divers, who are able to explore the wreckage and learn about the ship's history.

One of the most fascinating parts of the Aachen is the cabin that was located on board. The cabin was most likely used by the ship's captain or other high-ranking official and would have been a luxurious and comfortable space during the ship's voyage. Today, the cabin lies in ruins, a haunting reminder of the sudden and violent end that the ship and its passengers met.

The cabin is well preserved and can be easily accessed by divers, providing a glimpse into the lifestyle of the ship's passengers during the early 20th century. The cabin features include a desk, a bed, a wardrobe and other furniture, which are covered in marine growths, but still in good condition. You can still see the intricate details of the cabin's decor, such as the ornate moldings and the inlayed woodwork, which would have been a symbol of luxury and status at the time.

Despite the tragic fate of the Aachen and its passengers, the ship's remains serve as an important historical site. It is a reminder of the sacrifices made during World War I and the devastation that war can bring. Divers can explore the cabin and the rest of the ship to gain a deeper understanding of the past and pay their respects to those who lost their lives on the Aachen.

[thieves-in-the-palace]

okay so apparently the shiny new thing is much shinier and newer than I thought, here’s a rundown of what info I can find

The protagonist has no official name yet, as is typical. He’ll probably get an unofficial and official one later, much like Akira/Ren and the previous protagonists. His codename is Wonder.

His Persona is Janosik, presumably based off the Slovak highwayman Juraj Jánošík. Though the real Jánošík was understandably Just Some Guy (of the robber variety), his name has been attached to the concept of a folk hero comparable to Robin Hood – someone who steals from the rich and gives to the poor.

His design seems to be directly based off of Joker’s, to the point I’d wager that they probably share (or at least have extremely similar) model rigs. He wields a knife.

☆ ★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★

Our little animal dude this time around appears to be an owl named Lufiel / Luffy. His codename is Cattle for some reason??

His Persona is Rob Roy, who takes on a distinctly mecha appearance for being based off a Scottish outlaw. Rob Roy, real name Robert MacGregor, became a folk hero within his own lifetime after a dramatized account of his life (The Highland Rogue) was published in 1723; MacGregor was 52 years old at the time.

Like Morgana, Lufiel’s appearance switches between “fairly normal animal” and “just a little guy” depending on which world he’s in. Also like Morgana, he can transform into a vehicle and transport the other main characters. He appears to wield tonfa.

☆ ★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★

The third and final identified member of the main cast at the moment is Motoha Arai, codename Closer.

Her Persona appears to be Arveda, though don’t take that spelling to heart. Given the nautical-themed appearance, I THINK it’s based off Alfhild, Viking pirate and daughter of Geatish king Siward. When her father arranged for her to marry Prince Alf of Denmark, Alfhild ran and became a pirate instead, captaining crews of other female pirates and raiding along the Baltic coasts.

Ngl I’m pretty sure she’s the final form of that one untextured model found in P5′s data. God help me but I don’t know what to call her weapon, it’s a chain with a weight on the end?

☆ ★ ☆ ★ ☆ ★

Other stuff of note:

A female student at Kiba Kokatsu Academy, which is the featured high school this time around. It’s unclear if this character will join the main team.

The design of a strange new app which, like the MetaNav, appears abruptly on phones, can’t be deleted, and allows access to a separate world.

New Velvet Room attendant! Her name appears to be Merope, breaking from the Frankenstein character naming convention the other Velvet Room attendants have followed.

[whencyclopedia]

Great Northern War

The Great Northern War took place from 1700 to 1721 and was fought between Russia and Sweden during the reign of Peter I of Russia (Peter the Great). One of the key causes of the war was Peter the Great’s desire to have territory on the Baltic Sea and to gain access to the Black Sea.

Continue reading...

[mariacallous]

Russia is up to so much mischief around the Baltic Sea that even the things that it ends up not doing cause Western alarm bells to ring.

In just the past few days, Russia has floated a now-you-see it, now-you-don’t unilateral plan to change its maritime borders with Lithuania and Finland; tried to sneak its way closer to Estonia; and spooked the head of the Swedish Armed Forces so hard that he publicly feared for the safety of Gotland, Sweden’s biggest Baltic island. 

All that came on the heels of a broadening campaign of apparent Russian sabotage across the region, including mysterious fires, disrupted trains, and damaged undersea pipelines. A Russian spy ship is heading to the Gulf of Finland to keep an eye on things. The Norwegian police just warned about a new Russian campaign to sabotage Western arms deliveries to Ukraine, invoking the same “see something, say something” public warnings used for terrorist outfits. Due to sabotage fears, Poland had to increase security at the main airport that transports aid deliveries to Ukraine. All the while, Russian efforts to jam GPS signals for commercial aviation in the region continue apace.

Together, the Russian moves are meant to test boundaries—sometimes literally—as well as provoke a response, distract its neighbors, and swarm the West with the kitchen sink of full-spectrum harassment. For Russia, the battlefield is most certainly not limited to Ukraine, and when it comes to expanding it, the Baltic region holds a special place both in Russia’s imperialist past and Moscow’s expansionist present.

“The last time Russia had this little access in the Baltic was centuries ago,” said Charly Salonius-Pasternak, a researcher with the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. In Russian President Vladimir Putin’s mind, “for Russia to be recognized as a great power, it must be dominant in the Baltic Sea. That clearly wasn’t the case before NATO expansion, and now is even less so.”

The moves afoot aren’t the traditional kind of land grabs, such as the ones that Russia previously pulled off in Crimea and eastern Ukraine, and is now attempting with the rest of the country. But it may be Putin’s marker for a new kind of low-intensity campaign, Salonious-Pasternak said.

“Somewhere in his mind, he may have this idea, not to do what the USSR did, but to cause continuous mayhem until he has the resources to do something about it,” he added.

Consider the curious case of the Russian bid to change its maritime borders with Lithuania and Finland. The Russian Defense Ministry released the proposal publicly, but it mysteriously disappeared in less than a day; Russian officials denied that they were seeking to change the border. But the very notion sparked a furious response from Russia’s neighbors—Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis called it “an obvious escalation against NATO and the EU”—while the whole spat highlighted the difficulties of dealing with such inchoate threats.

“To me, it looks like a provocation,” said Martin Kragh, a senior research fellow at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs. “No matter how the West responds, it will have an effect at a very low cost for Russia. If the West makes a strong response, it can use that for domestic and international propaganda purposes; if they don’t, Russia can exploit that, arguing the claims are legitimate. It’s a ‘heads-I-win, tails-you-lose’ situation.”

The small changes to the maritime map may not have come to pass yet, but the Baltic states and several other NATO neighbors are taking no chances with what Kragh calls Russia’s strategy of “creeping annexation.” 

Over the weekend, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—alongside Finland, Norway, and Poland—announced plans for a “drone border wall” to protect against Russia’s encroachments and destabilizing maneuvers on the borders by enhancing video surveillance of the sprawling frontier. Estonia, like Norway, has also stepped up its public warnings about Russian misbehavior on the border and regional sabotage more broadly. NATO held the first meeting of its new Critical Undersea Infrastructure Network last week, with a particular eye on Russia. Even Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is otherwise engaged, took the time while speaking to reporters over the weekend to recognize the clear and present danger that Russian designs pose to the Baltics.

To make sense of why Russia, with a grinding war on its hands in Ukraine, is busy making mischief in the Baltic Sea requires understanding both what’s new and what’s eternal for Russia’s regional objectives. 

What’s new is that with the accession of Finland and Sweden to the Western alliance since early 2023, the Baltic has become, for all intents and purposes, a NATO lake, with member states now ringing the entire body of water— with the exception of a bit of Russia. Though Putin downplayed the significance of that seismic shift at the time, and some Western commentators stress the need for even more NATO vigilance in the region despite the expansion, the geostrategic shift was fundamental.

As a result, Russia realizes that due to its own actions in Ukraine, it has lost ground in an area crucial to its international power projection. That’s why it is lashing out in the region, albeit haphazardly, as a French report noted in November 2023 and a Norwegian intelligence assessment put it earlier this year.

“If you want to undermine the collective West, then these regions—the Gulf of Finland, Estonia, Lithuania—all those territories are easy to access for Russia,” Kragh said. “They don’t have any other borders when it comes to challenging the West.”

But the reason that the loss of the Baltic hurts Russia so much, and Putin in particular, is not just because of Finland and Sweden’s military might (Sweden just gave Ukraine a massive arms assistance package) and the reach of geography. There is also the weight of history. 

Since the time of Peter the Great, Putin’s self-styled role model, Russia’s window to the West (and to great-power status) has come through the chilly waters of the Baltic. Russian imperial aspirations in the 18th and 19th centuries came through the defeat of Sweden and the vassalization of Finland. Later, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, when not busy carving up Eastern Europe otherwise, briefly made a postwar bid for Bornholm, a strategic Danish island. Putin will be hard-pressed to make Russia great again if he can’t scrape back a semblance of power in the Baltic.

“Of course it’s a blow to have the Baltic Sea turned into a NATO lake. The Baltic has been a crucial objective of Russian and Soviet foreign and military policy since the time of Peter I,” said Norman Naimark, a historian at Stanford University who has written about Bornholm and other Soviet adventures. “Putin is also a Leningrader, which means that he has a special eye on access to the Baltic and egress into and out of the belts and the sound,” he said, referring to the critical straits connecting the Baltic to the wider world.

Russia’s neighbors haven’t been shy about calling out Moscow’s latest provocations. But that doesn’t mean that the mischief will stop any time soon, as long as it offers Putin a way to redress, even partially, what he sees as a geographic and historic imbalance.

“What is fascinating is the innovation in the Russian toolbox. They keep finding new ways of pushing,” Kragh said. “It’s like playing whack-a-mole—you keep hitting them, and they pop up somewhere else. The Baltic Sea simply provides a very good and opportunistic area for them to operate in.”

[tomorrowusa]

Sweden officially joined NATO on Thursday. It had been neutral since 1814.

One of Putin's pretexts for his illegal invasion of Ukraine was to prevent NATO expansion. What the invasion really did was to cause NATO to become reinvigorated and expanded.

With Finland and Sweden joining NATO, the land border between Russia and NATO has doubled in length. And the Baltic is now a Sea of NATO with Russia holding only a couple of relatively short strips of coastline near Kaliningrad and Saint Petersburg. This represents a spectacular strategic failure for Putin.

Sweden on Thursday formally joined NATO as the 32nd member of the transatlantic military alliance, ending decades of post-World War II neutrality as concerns about Russian aggression in Europe have spiked following Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson and Secretary of State Antony Blinken presided at a ceremony in which Sweden's "instrument of accession" to the alliance was officially deposited at the State Department. "This is a historic moment for Sweden. It's historic for alliance. It's history for the transatlantic relationship," Blinken said. "Our NATO alliance is now stronger, larger than it's ever been." Kristersson wrote in a social media post that "we are therefore a safer country." Later Thursday. Kristersson will visit the White House and then be a guest of honor at President Joe Biden's State of the Union address to Congress.

Ukraine will eventually join NATO but it probably won't happen while active hostilities continue. Expect to hear Sweden mentioned at the State of the Union address.

Biden, in his speech to Congress, is expected to cite Sweden's accession to NATO as evidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin's intent to divide and weaken the alliance has failed as a direct result of the Ukraine invasion. And, the Democratic president is expected to use Sweden's decision to join to step up calls for reluctant Republicans to approved stalled military assistance to Ukraine as the war enters its third year. Biden and his NATO counterparts have vowed that Ukraine will join one day, too.

Russian imperialism of the past 300 years has caused its neighbors to seek more protection against it. Few people in Eastern Europe have fond memories of being Russian or Soviet colonies. With Putin acting like a хуйло for the past 20 years, the only safe option is NATO membership.

[unhonestlymirror]

Jan Długosz:

"They say that during the civil wars that broke out first between Marius and Sulla, and then between Julius Caesar and Pompey the Great and their successors, they left their ancient places of residence and their fatherland in the confidence that all Italy would perish in mutual extermination. Together with their wives, livestock and household members, the Lithuanians came to vast and deserted spaces accessible only to animals, almost constantly exposed to burning frosts and called “forests” by writers, to the northern country, which they, by their father’s and ancient name (Italy), called Litalia(nowadays, due to some change, it is called Lithuania by the Poles and Russians), and they gave the tribe the name Litalov, adding only the letter “l” in front, which the Italians still add today in their folk language. Before accepting the true faith, they revered the same shrines, the same gods and celebrated the same sacred rites and festivals that existed among the Romans when they were pagans, namely: the sacred fire, which the Romans superstitiously maintained continuously, and in Rome Jupiter the Thunderer, [...] also the forests, which they considered sacred and which to touch with iron were considered wicked and disastrous, for everyone who touched them with iron and raised a hand to them, the cunning and crafty Satan, with God's permission, struck them in the hand, eye, leg or another part of the body [...]"

N.B. This obviously can not be true because Lietuva/Litva means "the country of rain" from the word "lyti" and, well, 500 Romans who got used to the luxury of Italy would not choose absolutely barren, deserted and undeveloped lands to emigrate to... which means Lithuania and other Baltic tribes were quite nice to live in back then. :D but I still find this funny.

[blueiscoool]

Tombs Rich in Artifacts Discovered in Cyprus

An archaeological expedition from Sweden's University of Gothenburg has uncovered tombs rich in artifacts and antiquities in Cyprus that makes the discovery among the richest ever found in the Mediterranean region.

Peter Fischer, the leader of the expedition and a professor of archaeology at the University of Gothenburg, said “considering the richness of the grave goods, it is a reasonable assumption that these were royal tombs, even though we do not know much about the form of government practiced in the city at the time."

Fischer believes that the artifacts, found just outside the Bronze Age trading city of Hala Sultan Tekke, indicate the tombs' occupants ruled the city, which was a center for copper trade between 1500–1300 BCE. The tombs, located outside the 50-hectare city, consist of underground chambers of varying sizes, accessed via a narrow passage from the surface.

Cyprus' Department of Antiquities, in an update posted to their website, noted: "The city’s wealth seems to have been based on the production of copper and trade with near and distant cultures. Judging by the rich burial gifts, the tombs belonged to families of the city’s ruling class who took part in the export of copper and intercultural trade."

Unearthed artifacts include imports from Egypt, Baltic region

The Swedish Söderberg expedition has been carrying out excavations in Hala Sultan Tekke near the city of Larnaca on the south coast of Cyprus since 2010. Though the expedition has previously found chamber tombs with valuable grave goods, the latest discovery is unprecedented given the superb quality and quantity of artifacts.

“We found more than 500 complete artifacts distributed among two tombs. Many of the artifacts consist of precious metals, gems, ivory and high-quality ceramics," Fischer said.

About half of the artifacts unearthed during the expedition are believed to have been imported from different civilizations. For example, gold and ivory came from Egypt while precious stones, such as blue lapis lazuli, dark red carnelian and blue-green turquoise, were imported from Afghanistan, India and Sinai respectively. Amber objects from the Baltic region were also found among the artifacts.

The Department of Antiquities said that three chamber tombs, preliminarily dated to the 14th century BC, were exposed. While one of them had been looted, most likely in the 19th century AD, the other two were "undisturbed", apart from the collapse of their chambers.

Items recovered from those include locally produced pottery and ornaments and numerous items of jewelry such as diadems, which are ornamental headbands. Embossed images of bulls, gazelles, lions and flowers adorn the diadems. Bronze weapons, some inlaid with ivory, were also recovered as well as a gold-framed seal made of the hard mineral hematite with inscriptions of gods and rulers.

"Several items of ivory and faience are imports from Egypt during the famous 18th Dynasty, the time of the well-known pharaohs Thutmose III, Amenophis IV (Akhenaten) and his wife Nefertiti," said the department.

The excavation team used magnetometers, a type of instrument that can produce images showing objects and structures up to two meters beneath the surface, to carry out their expedition, according to the university.

Besides artifacts, the research team also unearthed several well-preserved skeletons in the tombs including one of a woman surrounded by dozens of ceramic vessels, jewelry and a round bronze mirror. A one-year-old child with a ceramic toy also lay beside her.

By Saman Shafiq.