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The Ukrainian military, as a result of long-range ATACMS missile strikes on enemy airfields in temporarily occupied Berdiansk and Luhansk, destroyed 9 Russian helicopters, with 15 more being damaged, according to Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) analyst, investigator, and author of Oryx and Bellingcat projects, Jakub Janovsky.
According to the analyst, the attack destroyed seven Ka-52 Alligator helicopters and two Mi-8 helicopters of the Russians.
In addition, 15 helicopters—eight Ka-52s and seven Mi-8s—sustained damage.
Janovsky noted that, for reliability, Oryx classified helicopters not subject to restoration as damaged. Most likely, he mentioned, these are irreversible losses, but there is currently no sufficient evidence to assert this.
Recall that on the night of October 17, the Ukrainian military launched missile strikes on airfields in temporarily occupied Luhansk and Berdiansk.
Later, U.S. media reported that the Ukrainian Armed Forces used American ATACMS missiles for the attack. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed this information.
The White House also officially confirmed the transfer of missiles.
Later, satellite images of the Berdiansk airfield after the ATACMS strike appeared online, followed by images of the airport in Luhansk.
As a result of the attack, Russian helicopters were destroyed, although the Russians are currently concealing their losses.
Of course, the US will whine when Russia gives long range missile systems to the Syrians or Hezbollah that then use them to attack US warships.
Through visual analysis of satellite imagery, our team found Russian military vehicle losses in Avdiivka between October 10 and October 20. The total number exceeded 109, indicating a significant loss of approximately aligning to a brigade-sized force in just ten days
Some quality CGI here:
https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1716492677875748978
Through visual analysis of satellite imagery, our team found Russian military vehicle losses in Avdiivka between October 10 and October 20. The total number exceeded 109, indicating a significant loss of approximately aligning to a brigade-sized force in just ten days
"Through visual analysis of satellite imagery, our team found Russian military vehicle losses in Avdiivka between October 10 and October 20. The total number exceeded 109, indicating a significant loss of approximately aligning to a brigade-sized force in just ten days"
If this is true, then how come the Crimea and Eastern Ukraine are now part of Russia? The above narrative contradicts the reality on the ground.
I laugh when people use the word "Illegal." WTF was this country doing for the last 30-40 years?
Might is right, and those who whine when it's the other side doing the same thing that our side has been doing continually since that time is the quintessence of hypocrisy.
I laugh when the Russian boosters cry about "coups" in Ukraine justifying Russia's cockup of an invasion getting hundreds of thousands of people killed.
The US killed about 800,000 Iraqis over a non existent weapons of mass destruction program.
socal2: "Uh - because Russia illegally invaded and took it before Ukraine was mobilized and armed with superior Western weapons?"
Tucker on Jailing Priests in Ukraine
Ep. 34 Of all of Biden’s crimes, backing the Ukrainian government as it throws priests in jail may be the most revealing.
socal2 says
"Chairman of Russia's oil major Lukoil dies suddenly aged 66"
Was he vaxxed?
The article explained, even if the manpower problem could be solved, more aid would just be stolen at this point anyway:
Amid all the pressure to root out corruption, I assumed, perhaps naively, that officials in Ukraine would think twice before taking a bribe or pocketing state funds. But when I made this point to a top presidential adviser in early October, he asked me to turn off my audio recorder so he could speak more freely. “Simon, you’re mistaken,” he says. “People are stealing like there’s no tomorrow.”
Doesn’t sound like a very good advertisement for sending even more money to Ukraine, does it?
socal2 says
"Chairman of Russia's oil major Lukoil dies suddenly aged 66"
Was he vaxxed?
In April 1993, Kravchuk confided to then-Georgian president Eduard Shevardnadze his “main headache” that “Moscow and the US together have been twisting my arms painfully” in “demanding [the] transfer [of Ukraine’s nuclear weapons] to the Russian Federation.”
“I would understand Russia’s nastiness,“ Kravchuk said, “But Americans are even worse—they do not listen to our arguments.“
Shevardnadze stressed that the so-called Russian democrats led by Yeltsin, in fact, didn’t drop imperial ambitions, and that is why Americans are deeply mistaken in trying to make a deal with them at the expense of Ukrainian and other post-Soviet republics’ interests:
“[The Americans] do not know about our terrible, rough relations with the Russian empire [and] the USSR. Without that knowledge, building predictable and trustworthy relations with ‘democratic Yeltsin and Russia’ would be very difficult, whom [the Americans] currently call ‘Russian democrats’…I know many of them, talked to them a lot. They are still sick with imperial infection.”
He went on, referring to his previous job — as Soviet foreign minister:
“Being a member of the Politburo I had access to many confidential and top-secret documents—secret reports, notes, different non-papers elaborated in different Soviet structures—the Central Committee offices, KGB, Military Intelligence, think tanks and so forth…I can say that the documents I have read were just horrible and frightening: about the different scenarios of relations of the Center [Moscow] with the Soviet republics… They included the partition of those republics, expelling their populations to different parts of Siberia and the Soviet Far East—indeed some remote places. To accomplish those goals, they will use military force. All those plans are not archival ones! They are fully intact to be used if Moscow makes that decision.”"
Shevardnadze implored Kravchuk in 1993 to “negotiate so as not to undermine your independence and your security,” saying that “if Ukraine succeeds in keeping at least one nuclear missile as a deterrent,” it will safeguard its independence “from those madmen in the Kremlin.”
The history of nuclear disarmament of Ukraine under US pressure becomes even more striking, given that the US knew about Russian intentions to subjugate Ukraine under its control and even considered the Russian invasion of Ukraine possible. Following the final trip to Moscow ahead of the Budapest memorandum, Talbott asked then Secretary of State Warren Christopher rhetorically:
“Do we have good answers to questions about what we’ll do if reality refuses to follow the script we’re writing for it? What if Russia invades Ukraine?”
The question was never considered seriously enough in a theoretical hope that in the future when needed, such a possibility of invasion could be negotiated away with Moscow. Generally, the new imperial ambitions of Moscow were ignored by the US leaders, blinded by the strongly desired illusion of the seemingly democratic new Yeltsin’s Russia.
While Russia will not outright win the war, a Ukrainian victory is becoming less and less likely.
France 24 ran a freedom-loving story yesterday headlined, “Zelenskyy Calls Holding Elections in Wartime Ukraine 'Utterly Irresponsible’.”
https://www.voanews.com/a/war-on-ukraine-focus-of-russian-economy/7343244.html
It’s true Zelensky said that, but the actual news that happened was Zelensky cancelled another election cycle because Putin. We must save Ukraine to save democracy! We must not let the tiny flicker of democracy fizzle out in Ukraine! Well, we must save the ideal of democracy anyway. Over in Eastern Europe, like in Gaza, democracy per se doesn’t always involve actual elections, not proper ones.
The whole thing is very complicated and you just wouldn’t understand. Don’t bother your pretty little heads about it. Just keep paying your taxes. Freedom!
It is clear that some politicians and media outlets have been promoting a "conflict-freezing" narrative, that bears a striking resemblance to the approach outlined in Russian doctrinal thought.
To delve into it, let's look at an actual professional analysis - the report formulated by The Center for Naval Analyses under the US government contract, which outlines Russian military strategy
In 2021, a team of analysts led by
@KofmanMichael
released a document called "Russian Military Strategy: Core Tenets and Operational Concepts". This paper explores the core tenets of Russian military strategy. The paper states that Russian military strategy reflects that Russia expects to be the militarily inferior party in a regional or large-scale war against a technologically superior adversary.
Of particular relevance to our discussion is this excerpt: "The overall task for Russian military strategy is to prevent an opponent from achieving a decisive outcome during the initial period of war, force them into a conflict of attrition, and inflict costs on their military and economic infrastructure such that they will seek war termination on acceptable terms."
While originally designed for scenarios against a larger adversary like NATO, the core tenet of this strategy applies to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The objective is to hinder Ukraine from achieving decisive outcomes, push Ukraine into attrition, and impose costs on their military and economic infrastructure, compelling them to seek war termination on terms favorable to Russia.
Now, let's step back and examine the strategic objectives of both countries:
- Russia aimed to replace the Ukrainian government, install a puppet regime, and gain control over Ukrainian territory. Failing to achieve these goals, Russia has had to adjust its objectives. Currently, the likelihood of achieving initial goals appears unrealistic.
- Ukraine's strategic goals focus on liberating all its territories and reverting to internationally recognized borders. While Russia struggles to achieve its strategic goals, it retains the ability to thwart Ukraine's strategic goals, evident in events during the counter-offensive in the summer and fall of 2023.
This understanding is crucial. Returning to the document, let's reiterate: "The goal is to prevent the adversary from achieving a decisive outcome, force them into a conflict of attrition, and inflict costs on their military and economic infrastructure such that they will seek war termination on acceptable terms."
In March 2019 at the Russian Academy of Military Sciences, General Gerasimov acknowledged the "emergence of new spheres of confrontation in modern conflicts and methods of warfare increasingly shift towards the integrated application of political, economic, informational, and other nonmilitary measures, realized with reliance on military force."
Russian theorists perceive information warfare as a potent tool capable of disrupting an opponent's command and control, deceiving adversaries, fostering instability within enemy borders, and demoralizing both civilian populations and military forces to the extent that they lose the will to resist.
Let's shift our focus from this research paper once more
This approach is not novel. The strategy of using "frozen conflicts" as a military and political tool has been employed by Russia since the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
The invasion of Moldova by Russian forces and the establishment of the so-called "Transnistria," which persists to this day in Moldova, serves as an example. Russia utilizes this entity to exert influence on Moldova and obstruct Eurointegration processes. This same strategy unfolded in Georgia and later in Ukraine.
When Ukraine opted not to engage with Russia in 2014 during the occupation of Crimea, the so-called "de-escalation" only led to a further invasion of Donetsk oblast by a group of russian operatives led by Girkin (Strelkov).
The Minsk agreements in 2014 and 2015 did not yield results; instead, they were followed by a russian invasion of Ukraine. Adhering to this pattern, now more explicitly outlined in Russian military doctrine, there are no signs that Russia is inclined to abandon or alter this course.
Therefore, any calls for a "frozen conflict" merely play into the achievement of military and political goals outlined in Russian military thought and assist Russia in preparing for the next phase.
In conclusion, it's apt to quote renowned military theorist Carl von Clausewitz: "The aggressor is always peace-loving, he would prefer to take over our country unopposed."
The only one crying for a cease fire right now are the folks in DC.
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