(* which Lenin evidently never said, but might have been a paraphrase of something Marx said, and which has been said by lots of other people since… )

1. Russia launched 376 missiles of various types at Ukraine in July, more than double June’s total. 126 were ballistic missiles such as Iskander-M and modified S-400s. Russia’s primary target has been the city of Kyiv and its surrounding districts. With rare exceptions, Russia’s strikes have been directed at civilian, not military, infrastructure (including a lot of apartment buildings). Due to a shortage of Patriot interceptor missiles, Ukraine has managed to shoot down fewer than a third of the missiles launched. Russia’s strategy seems to be to demoralize the population. History has shown that this sort of strategy has never forced a nation to surrender.

2. Which leads me to the whole Patriot missile fiasco. President Donald Trump promised to license Patriots to Ukraine, and then he walked it back. Meeting with Zelenskyy on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Ankara on 8 July, Trump unexpectedly told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that the U.S. would give Ukraine a license and show them how to manufacture Patriot missiles domestically. On 28 July Zelenskyy traveled to the White House, and afterward he stated that they had a productive meeting and that Trump had agreed to move forward with the production licensing process. But on 30 July, in an interview with the Financial Times, Trump first cast doubt on the plan, stating he was “not sure” if the U.S. would actually grant the manufacturing license, “because the Patriot system is an extraordinary weapon.” The following day, Trump explicitly backtracked and stated, “We have not agreed to that,” explaining that the sensitive nature of the technology makes it “a hard thing to give away”

As one of my critics pointed out a few weeks back, Trump would have to jump through all sorts of ITAR hoops to license Patriot technology to Ukraine. Professor Leo Strauss explained it on X. They’d have to go through Defense Technology Security Administration reviews to evaluate risks associated with munitions technology transfers, and obtain Direct Commercial Sales approval via the State Department. These regulations were implemented to prevent the misuse of critical technologies or items or from being diverted to unintended foreign parties. It took Poland 8 years to secure provisional approval to assemble Patriots on its own territory, and they’re not yet ready to enter production. The process has moved faster for Germany, but they’re not quite as far along as Poland is. I had assumed that Trump’s stooge Hegseth had cowed the Department of War (nee Defense) into doing his bidding, but the deep state still seems to be functioning. I stand corrected, and my apologies for getting people’s hopes up

(credit: Professor Leo Strauss.)

3. And Trump doesn’t have that many Patriots left to give anyone. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, roughly a third of pre-Iran-war Patriot interceptors are estimated to remain. And almost half the THAAD ABMs have been used up (THAADs are Terminal High Altitude Area Defense anti-ballistic missiles, a U.S. mobile military system that uses kinetic force to destroy incoming missiles during their final flight phase).

https://csis.org/analysis/renewed-iran-war-would-test-diminished-interceptor-inventories

(credit: CSIS.org)

4. The Washington Post reported that the late Senator Lindsey Graham sought to transfer Israel’s Iron Dome batteries to Ukraine to help intercept Russian attacks. The plan was ultimately blocked by Prime Minister Netanyahu, who invoked an agreement that gave Israel final approval over deploying the system abroad.

Netanyahu and Zelenskyy had what looked like a sharp exchange on the sidelines of Lindsey Graham’s funeral. Haaretz reports Ukrainian sources say Israel rejected the offer of a meeting between the two leaders in Washington. Netanyahu has consistently shown contempt for Zelenskyy. Netanyahu has a special relationship with Putin, dating back to when the Israelis had a delicate security coordination arrangement with Moscow that allowed Israeli military strikes against Iranian proxy targets in Russian-controlled Syrian airspace.

5. Speaking of the Gulf conflict, Trump’s on-again, off-again bombardments of Iran haven’t brought the mullahs to their knees. CENTCOM is keeping mum about US losses, but according to The Intercept, an anonymous official within the Pentagon said that “Iran’s military managed to overwhelm U.S. air defense systems using a mix of attack drones and advanced ballistic missiles, according to the official.” The official also said that “Iran has attacked at least nine U.S. outposts across the Middle East since July 9… and several of these bases suffered ‘significant’ damage in the attacks.”

https://theintercept.com/2026/07/28/iran-missiles-drones-us-air-defenses/

6. The Financial Times produced the following chart showing Russian refinery losses in capacity and production. According to the FT, only 8 of the 26 refineries Ukraine hit are fully restored. 11 are partially operational, and 7 are completely offline. Russia has lost approximately 45% of its refinery capacity. Their largest refinery in Omsk is back online, though. And Ukraine hit three of those refineries again this weekend (after this chart was posted). I haven’t heard the current estimated damages.

(Credit: The Financial Times.)

7. Ukraine also hit some more Wildberries distribution centers, and it’s also started striking Ozon’s distribution centers (I’m told that Ozon is like the eBay of Russia). According to Agentstvo, an independent Russian investigative media outlet, “the total area of damaged warehouses exceeds 1 million square meters, which is approximately 38% of the area of the company’s largest logistics facilities.”

According to Russian Central Bank sources, Wildberries owes VTB Bank US$10.6 billion, due this year at an interest rate of around 18%. And Wildberries has already been delinquent on its payments since 2025, and its current losses will likely force Wildberries to default. Some predict this will put VTB Bank into insolvency and cause the rest of Russia’s banking dominoes to collapse. We’ll see. I’m not holding my breath.

Tatyana Kim, the Wildberries CEO, held a video conference where she said, “I see online discussions from armchair experts about the protection of our facilities, air defense, and so on. I repeat: our warehouses are equipped with every available means of protection. From the first days of the attacks, we have been strengthening and reinforcing our line of defense daily, including with engineering solutions.” Russian milbloggers (the armchair experts) immediately mocked her (mercilessly) for that whopper of a claim.

She called the Ukrainians terrorists (that depends on your PoV), claimed her operation was no more connected with military logistics than Amazon and Ali Baba (probably true), and the only goal of these attacks was to cause panic and shock (true, but probably not the whole story when we include the VTB Bank loan).

(Tatyana Kim speaking on a video call.)

8. According to the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Russian forces suffered 42,860 casualties (killed and wounded) in July 2026, making July the highest casualty month so far this year (but not the war). Total Russian personnel losses for the first seven months of 2026 reached 238,650. Since over two-thirds of these were drone kills, Zelenskyy has pointed out that they have videos to back up their claims. What a strange new world we live in where the last minute of every soldier’s life will be digitally preserved forever.

This Fog o’ War will be brief because I’m working on some other writing projects. Some of those might eventually see the light of day here. But for now…

1. President Zelenskyy removed Oleksandr Syrskyi from the position of commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and replaced him with Major General Mykhailo Drapatyi. Drapatyi has a colorful biography. In 2014, he drove an armored vehicle through a separatist barricade in Mariupol to rescue police officers and Ukrainian soldiers who were being held as hostages in the Interior Ministry building. Besides having cojones, Drapatyi has displayed integrity. After a Russian missile hit the 239^th ground training center, killing twelve soldiers and wounding sixty others, Drapatyi submitted his resignation the same day, stating it was a conscious step dictated by his personal accountability for the tragedy and shortcomings in enforcing safety procedures. Zelenskyy didn’t accept his resignation, and now he’s the Commander-in-Chief.

In his acceptance statement, Drapatyi said, “Upon our shoulders—the shoulders of the Ukrainian people — has fallen a historic role: to complete the liberation struggle with our victory. We are destined to victory. It cannot be otherwise, and there can be no talk of any compromises or concessions.” Note: he’s been quoted as saying “doomed to victory,” but this seems to be a mistranslation of the Ukrainian. I haven’t seen the original of his speech Ukrainian, so I haven’t checked it myself.

The ”Flying BMP-2” video can be seen here…

A brief but concise article about Drapatyi can be found on the Al Jazeera site…

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/24/mykhailo-drapatyi-can-new-ukraine-army-chief-alter-russia-wars-direction

(Drapatyi in the center. Syrskyi has been moved into an advisory role sitting to his left. Credit: Armed Forces of Ukraine.)

2. Meanwhile, Mykhailo Fedorov has rejected every alternative post Zelenskyy has offered him, including making him deputy prime minister for military innovation (a ministry he would have to create from scratch). Reportedly, Fedorov has stated that there are only three positions he’d accept: the presidency, his old position as minister of defense, or commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. None of these are realistic options. If Zelenskyy reinstalls him in his old role as the Minister of Defense, he’d be setting a bad precedent where any subordinate can have a tantrum and make Zelenskyy back down. Insisting on the Presidency is effectively a coup against the legitimate leadership of Ukraine. And as brilliant as Fedorov is supposed to be, he hasn’t had any military experience to be the Commander-in-Chief. IMHO, Fedorov is starting to look like an egotistical dickhead.

According to some media outlets, the pro-Fedorov protests may be diminishing in size. We’ll see if Fedorov continues being stubborn and stays a political thorn in Zelenskyy’s side.

3. You may not have seen this, but Ukraine struck several vessels in the Caspian Sea that were transporting Russian military cargo to Iran. Reports suggest that two cargo ships and an unidentified naval vessel were hit. Zelenskyy confirmed these reports, stating, “We also achieved very strong results with long‑range strikes in the Caspian Sea – including vessels used in military cargo shipments involving Iran, as well as a warship.”

On X, Seyed Abbas Araghchi, the Iranian Foreign Minister, said, “Zelenskyy has attacked an Iranian commercial vessel, killing a sailor. A blatant UN Charter violation done at Israel’s behest to drag Europe into its war. In calls with EU High Rep Kallas and FM Lavrov, made clear that what the freeloader in Kyiv did CANNOT GO UNANSWERED.”

An account calling itself Middle East Spectator wrote on Telegram: “A gentle reminder to Mr. Zelensky: All of Ukraine is within reach of Iran’s ballistic missiles, including super-heavy Khorramshahr-4."

I just checked on Google Earth, and Tehran is about 2,000 km from Eastern Ukraine. If they’re not already, their capital will soon be in range of Ukraine’s long-range drones.

4. How many Wildberries logistics facilities has Ukraine struck? At least five. But I’ve seen reports that as of yesterday they’ve hit as many as eight. President Zelenskyy explained that these logistics hubs act as a pipeline for Russia to distribute dual-use technology and technical components crucial to the Russian army's battlefield operations. That may be, but attacking Wildberries warehouses is also psychological warfare. The boxes and packing supplies are highly flammable. The pillars of smoke are visible evidence that Ukraine is bringing the war to Russia, and they’re widely shared on Russian social media accounts. Moreover, according to the SF Chronicle, “Industry analysts estimate that roughly 500,000 to 800,000 sellers (and up to over 1 million by some broader counts) rely on Wildberries as a primary online sales channel and marketplace in Russia.” And Wildberries handles over fifty percent of consumer online orders in Russia. Ukraine is making Russian consumers feel the pain.

(The Wildberries hub in Krasnodar engulfed in flames.)

5. And finally, Caolan Robertson interviewed Major Robert “Madyar” Brovdi, commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces. The interview is up on YouTube (link below). He described how he came to see FPV drones as critical to frontline battle tactics, and how difficult it was to convince other commanders to use them. He also said, “Because Crimea is not self-sufficient in resources, so now we are closing the routes in. Not the routes out. We are not touching the Crimean Bridge, if you have noticed. Let them f**k off across it. Every last one of those millions can keep f**king off across that little bridge to Russia and then keep going far beyond the Ural Mountains where they can live peacefully.” Brovdi expressed his distaste for the Russian occupiers, and he compared the drone operations in Crimea to de-worming a pet.

But Fedorov wasn’t simply kicked out the door. Zelenskyy offered him the role of Prime Minister, but Fedorov refused. Some Ukrainian commentators suggested that Zelenskyy was jealous that Fedorov’s political star was rising, but if you want to kneecap a political rival, you don’t offer them the role of Prime Minister. Another storyline is that Fedorov was uncovering corruption among Zelenskyy’s friends and allies in the government and the military. But it was Zelenskyy who commissioned Fedorov to audit military expenditures and contracts, and while Fedorov found some corruption, most of the roughly $7 billion in misspent funds he identified was waste rather than fraud. Certainly Fedorov made some enemies within the AFU, but that was more because he was identifying budgetary and contracting incompetence rather than outright fraud. That’s not to say Zelenskyy or Syrskyi haven’t feathered their own nests. The Kyiv Independent suggests there may be financial shenanigans. But they’re nowhere near the vast corruption that pervades all levels of the Russian military and political system. And there is that luxury home in a gated community that one of Zelenskyy’s political fixers may have intended to give him (but that’s still an open question). Ukraine seems to be doing a good job reining in corruption.

No, I think the simplest explanation works. Zelenskyy had to choose between two feuding subordinates, and he chose the one he had the longest working relationship with, thinking it would cause less fuss if he kicked the other one upstairs. But he miscalculated.

https://www.politico.eu/article/volodymyr-zelenskyy-oust-defense-minister-mykhailo-fedorov-yevhenii-khmara/

(Fedorov vs. Syrskyi)

2. But Ukrainians turned out en masse all across the country to protest Fedorov’s dismissal. After all, under Fedorov, Ukraine is clearly turning the tide against the Russians. Even though Zelenskyy and Fedorov issued a joint statement that they’ll work things out, people were still out protesting as of this evening.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jul/18/ukraine-war-briefing-protests-of-fedorovs-dismissal-continue-as-zelenskyy-tries-to-repair-rift-with-poland

(Credit: PBS News)

3. The day after his dismissal, Fedorov held a long press conference. Per Phillips P. O’Brien: “Fedorov, thankfully, chose not to go quietly. When his dismissal was made clear, he gave a press conference in which he outlined his vision point by point and described what he was trying to achieve. Here is an English-language translation of the press conference, which really is too long and detailed to quote, but provides a great glimpse into why he was so important.” The entire hour-and-a-half-long press conference is available at this link.

https://censor.net/en/resonance/4014082/mykhailo-fedorov-s-press-briefing-following-his-resignation

Some headlines say that Fedorov blasted Syrskyi in the press conference. If anything, he was low-key about his criticism of Syrskyi. “I said: ‘Then we will defeat Russia with this Commander-in-Chief.’ Because Syrskyi did, in fact, help save our country in 2022. ... We cannot underestimate a commander like that. But the war has changed completely. ... We cannot continue relying on what worked back then. We must understand what worked well at that time and what we need to do now to defeat Russia...”

However, Fedorov was quite blunt when he said that Syrskyi blocked some of his initiatives, and he “avoided discussing problems, and chose intrigue and media blame.”

He also listed eleven major problems he found in the Ministry of Defense and the Armed Forces of Ukraine…

https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2026/07/16/8044357/

And some highlights from his press conference can be viewed here.

4. A group of Ukrainian MPs initiated a presidential request to consider dismissing Commander in Chief Syrskyi and to appoint a successor “based on professional effectiveness and measurable technological results.” They also requested regular closed-door military briefings to parliament.

Others have had trouble working with Syrskyi. In May Dmytro Kashchenko, also a Hero of Ukraine, and deputy commander the 20th Army Corps resigned. He complained of Syrkyi’s harsh command style, excessive micromanagement. And Pavlo Yelizarov Deputy Commander of the airforce and developer of Ukraine’s laser defenses stepped down in protest of Fedorov’s dismissal. According to The Kyiv Independent, Yelizarov stated in his resignation letter that the removal of Fedorov “would cause more casualties and destruction in Ukraine from Russian missile and drone attacks.”

For his part, Syrskyi publicly thanked Fedorov for his service. However, the commanders of the Navy and Air Assault Forces have stated that they back Syrskyi, and they’ve condemned the protests that they say are trying to divide to country.

https://kyivindependent.com/navy-and-assault-forces-commanders-back-syrskyi-condemn-attempts-to-divide-society-amid-mass-protests/

5. Zelenskyy met with Fedorov to try to defuse the crisis. The following statement was echoed vebatim by many commentators on X. I can’t find the source, but “According to preliminary information from the President's advisors, Mykhailo Fedorov will receive a direct appointment to the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine (NSDC) as Head of the Defense MilTech Coordination Council and Strategic Planning. This status will place him directly under the President and provide an expanded mandate: Coordination of all defense developments: The Brave1 platform, production of long-range unmanned systems, and missile program will come under his direct oversight, bypassing mid-level approvals from the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff. Audit of military procurement: Creation of a transparent digital control system for the logistics of the Defense Forces and elimination of corruption risks.”

After meeting with Fedorov, Zelenskyy said: “I’ve had a lot of consultations yesterday and today. Of course, I hear what people are saying. I’ve had a long conversation with Mykhailo Fedorov today. I’ve also spoken with Oleksandr Syrskyi today. Decisions regarding the army will be developed. I thank everyone who cares for Ukraine. I thank everyone who defends our positions on the frontlines. … Slava Ukraini!”

Fedorov said: “Changes will definitely come.... I’m thankful to you for the hope. I haven’t felt such responsibility even at governmental positions. I‘m thankful to veterans and the military for holding up the frontlines and the honor. There is dialogue. I trust everything will work out.”

6. There were other unintended downstream effects of Fedorov’s dismissal. Zelenskyy offered the post of Defense Minister to Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko, but it quickly became clear that he lacked enough votes in parliament to confirm Klymenko in the position. Recognizing that he didn’t have support, Klymenko withdrew his candidacy. But the successor to Klymenko’s interior ministry position had already been confirmed, leaving Zelenskyy ally Klymenko out in the cold without a ministerial post. Zelenskyy then appointed Yevhenii Khmara as the acting defense minister of Ukraine. Khmara, a major general, was the acting head of the SBU (Ukraine’s Security Services).

And instead of Fedorov, Zelenskyy appointed Sergii Koretskyi as the country's Prime Minister. Parliament immediately approved his nomination. Koretskyi previously served as the CEO of the state-owned energy company Naftogaz.

7. And why did Zelenskyy decide to reshuffle his cabinet now, after serving in office for less than a year? Lots of speculation. But I bet Zelenskyy now wishes he’d dealt with the Fedorov-Syrskyi issue separately instead of having his larger cabinet reshuffle go awry.

https://www.dw.com/en/zelenskyy-ukraine-government-reshuffle/a-77959640

8. Russian milbloggers were initially ecstatic with the Fedorov dismissal. Alexey Zhivov wrote, “It’s very good that Zelenskyy removed him from managing the army. He was simply too intelligent and effective an adversary. Things should be easier now.” A blogger with the handle Military Informant thanked Fedorov and Zelenskyy for “shedding light on the behind-the-scenes intrigues of the opposition. And if the dismissal is finalized, then we should also thank Zelenskyy for removing the young and competent Minister of Defence of Ukraine, who has caused so many problems in the past six months.” He wrote that Fedorov “brought much that was new and unpleasant to the Russian Armed Forces, particularly in the context of the Starlink shutdown, the escalation of mid-range kamikaze drone strikes against logistics, the introduction of AI into the Ukrainian…” (h/t to @ChrisO_wiki on X).

https://t.me/zhivoff/27213

https://t.me/milinfolive/176217

9. But glee turned to puzzlement and then dismay when the protests began and they realized Fedorov might get a new position with even more influence. Margarita Simonyan huffed why Ukrainian authorities would allow such protests, but she hopes they’ll lead to Zelenkyy’s ouster. Oleh Belousov, who regularly mocks Russian propagandists on Ukrainian social media noted that “their entire worldview has been turned upside down. They simply cannot understand how any of this is possible. How could the dismissal of a single minister trigger demonstrations so large that thousands of people have taken to the streets in major cities … to demand change? How can the police simply stand aside while the government is forced to listen to the public? How can a minister hold a briefing and without empty rhetoric or theatrics tell people everything that has been happening behind the scenes at his ministry? And how can that lead not to his assassination but to an enormous wave of public momentum? One powerful enough to force the president to admit their mistake and move toward the right decision?”

10. In more pracitical war news, Ukraine’s Operation MoLoCHKa has expanded from striking Russian shipping in the Sea of Azov to the entire Black Sea. As of 17 July Magyar’s Birds — Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces (USF) — claimed they had disabled 172 vessels in thirteen days of operation — 118 in the Sea of Azov and 54 in the Black Sea. The USF is targeting engines and conning towers of ships to turn them into floating hulks to avoid ecological damage from oil slicks. Reportedly, the Russian Navy is pressing army anti-drone teams from the occupied territories to serve on civilian and military ships. It’s unclear if they have had any effect fending off Ukrainian attacks yet, but Russian milbloggers are worried that the Navy is weakening Russian defenses in the occupied territories by this move.

As retaliation, Russia has been striking Ukrainian cargo ships in the port of Odessa.

MoLoCHKa is the name of the large-scale maritime drone operation that’s targeting Russia’s shadow fleet of oil tankers and cargo vessels in the Black Sea and Sea of Azov. The acronym stands for Москва ляже через Крим (Moscow will fall through Crimea).

11. I found this chart to be interesting. While we’ve seen lots of stories about gasoline shortages across Russia, Mediazona used anonymised payment-card transaction data from three of Russia’s largest banks—Sber, T-Bank and Alfa-Bank— to compile this map of showing which petrol stations actually dispensed fuel between 13 and 14 July. Despite insanely long wait lines, gasoline is still available at most filling stations. In fact, only in Crimea, Chechnya, and Dagastan, do 50 percent or fewer filling stations have gasoline. Yes, Ukrainian drone strikes have severely affected the production and distribution of retail gasoline and diesel, but gasoline and diesel are still available across Russia.

Jet fuel and gasoline production are down 50 percent. But diesel production has been the most impacted, and is down about 60 percent according to this Burggraben analysis.

12. Ukraine struck the Wildberries distribution center in Elektrosol, a city about 50 km outside Moscow. Wildberries is the Russian version of Amazon, and this was their largest distribution center. 188,000 square meters of warehouse and the goods inside were completely incinerated, casting heavy a pall of smoke over Moscow, and spreading across all of Moscow Oblast. Ukrainian drones struck a second facility in Kotovsk, Tambov Oblast, which was approximately 108,000 square meters in size. According to CNN, these strikes impacted up to 15% of the company's total warehouse space.

Zelenskyy and the Ukraine General Staff have confirmed they are now targeting Russian distribution and logistics centers. Russia has been targeting Ukraine’s Nova Poshta distribution centers for several years now. Nova Poshta is Ukraine’s largest private postal and courier company. Russia has claimed that Nova Poshta is a legitimate military target because they’re delivering supplies to Ukrainian troops on the front lines. And they are. But companies like Wildberries do the same for Russian troops. For instance, Russian units can order fiber-optic spools for their drones and body armor from Wildberries.

On a side note, Wildberries was founded in 2004 by the husband and wife team of Tatyana and Vladislav Bakalchuk. You may remember that they went through a rather nasty divorce, and they hired paramilitary teams to shoot up each other’s offices. The Russian government stepped in and gave the corporation to the Tatyana who reverted to her maiden name Kim after their divorce was finalized. I think the husband is still alive. I don’t know if he received any monetary compensation for losing his share of Wildberries.

Here a some images from the Wildberries fire…

Under this assessment, Putin is a rational player within the boundaries of his prejudices. And his exaggerated and false claims about Ukraine and the West are merely propaganda dressing for his actions. But I wonder if he doesn’t believe the delusional things he spouts. For instance, his claim that Zelenskyy, who is Jewish, is a Nazi. That NATO/OTAN has designs on invading Russia. That genocide against ethnic Russians is happening in Ukraine and the Baltic States.

This paper raises the question: should we take his obviously delusional statements as evidence of delusional thinking? “Mental disorder in Vladimir Putin: Hypothesis” by Sergei V. Jargin.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41564202/

> Putin formulated the aims of his military operation, one of them being protecting Russian-speakers from genocide. It is known that ethnic Russians have not undergone genocide. Apparently, this idea is delusional. Many people subscribe to delusions at large. Besides, there is a hypothesis that Putin has hubris syndrome. In conclusion, mental derangements in politicians should be diagnosed by psychiatrists on the basis of language and behavior.

Or is Putin’s behavior not the result of psychosis, but him recapitulating his childhood trauma — which would feed into the driven-by-grievance-and-pride assessment above.

“Exploring the significance of traumatic events on the individual characteristics of political leaders: A case study of Putin’s leadership style and the Russian opposition protests” by Terkulova et al.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2336825X251382117

> Findings suggest that the 2011 protests were a traumatic event for Putin, significantly influencing his leadership style and decision-making process. The study demonstrates that LTA effectively explains how traumatic experiences shape foreign policy behaviour. Furthermore, it reveals that such events can lead to more assertive or offensive foreign policy actions, as reflected in Putin’s subsequent policies. This research highlights the critical role of trauma in shaping leadership traits and political behaviour, contributing to a deeper understanding of leadership psychology and foreign policy in contemporary Russia.

(Credit: IMAGOECONOMICA via en.kremlin.ru.)

2. Russians got to watch Putin’s decision-making live on Russian state TV. On Wednesday, 8 July, Putin held a televised government meeting to address a fuel crisis. Deputy Prime Minister Novak told Putin some partial truth about the oil shortages. He said, “The Ukrainians are hitting us every day. We no longer know what to do. We have already banned diesel and gasoline exports. We have even started producing lower-quality fuel, and yet the situation is only getting worse. The shortage is not shrinking, and demand is only growing.” Putin listened and replied, “It’s nothing serious. The main thing is that people are doing fine, aren’t they? And you say Kiev wants to destroy our fuel sector and undermine the economy. Don’t talk nonsense. They won’t succeed.” Then he left the meeting.

(Screen grab from the Russian state TV broadcast.)

Following the meeting, on the Solovyov Live channel, Vladimir Solovyov expressed his amazement at the lack of urgency displayed by Putin and his ministers. “And in neither Novak’s remarks nor Putin’s was there a single word about organizing the defense of the refineries! Some people may still have illusions, but the enemy’s strategy is obvious. They will keep taking out refineries one by one, not with 40 drones or 100, but with 400 or 500 at a time, and then follow those strikes with ballistic missiles.”

(Vladimir Solovyov on Solovyov Live)

At various times in the past, Solovyov has called for a maximalist response to nuke Kyiv, Paris, and London. However, a political scientist (whose name I haven’t been able to identify) pointed out on Olga Skabeyeva’s show 60 Minutes that Russian leadership had made the mistake of thinking that the homeland was immune from the same sorts of drones and ballistic missiles that Russia was sending at Ukraine. And to talk of escalating to nukes would be unwise for the same reason. After all, he argued that Russian drones have already brought Ukraine to its knees and they’re on the brink of collapse. He suggested instead a more modest response: to strike Ukraine’s general staff HQ. There’s a lot of cognitive dissonance among the propagandists, but it’s interesting that the Russian security services are allowing criticism of the situation to surface on state-run media.

3. Leading up to the recent NATO summit in Turkey, Russian state media was all excited that Trump was about to drive a stake through the alliance and NATO would fully abandon Zelenskyy. Instead, Trump said that strikes on Russian infrastructure were “an escalation that could help bring the war to an end.” Rubio said Ukrainian strikes show how difficult it is for Russia to defend its own airspace.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov was asked by a reporter, “Does the Kremlin see this as Washington returning to a policy of escalation?” Peskov responded, “No, we do not. We see certain misconceptions within the White House administration. Misconceptions about the idea that escalation and military pressure can somehow help move the settlement process onto a peaceful track.”

4. After speaking with Zelenskyy, Trump said he intended to call Putin. But on the following day, Peskov said he hadn’t called yet, and that “President Trump was apparently very busy after all his meetings in Ankara. So yesterday no one called.” The Kremlin is still waiting for that call.

(Dmitri Peskov waiting for the phone to ring on Russian state TV.)

5. In regards to the Kremlin’s open invitation (demand?) that Zelenskyy meet them in Moscow, Trump said he told Putin that “you’re not going to meet in Moscow. You know it just doesn’t work. You can’t do that.” Then Trump turned to Zelenskyy and asked him, “Maybe he would. Would you go to Moscow?” Without batting an eye, Zelenskyy said, “It would be difficult. There are a lot of Ukrainian drones there.”

(Zelenskyy and Trump having a chat at the NATO conference. Credit: Sky News.)

6. At the summit, Trump also pledged to allow Ukraine a license to build its own Patriot interceptors, which has been a long-awaited goal of Kyiv. “We’ll give them the right to make Patriots,” he said. Fire Point Rocket Technologies used the Patriot design to engineer its own version, called the FP-7 (codenamed Freya). Reportedly, it includes numerous design improvements and can be manufactured more cheaply than the American version. Whether Ukraine needed permission from the US to manufacture a Patriot substitute on their own is an open question. Our European allies who were eager to partner with Ukraine on this initiative certainly didn’t want to provoke Trump. So, it’s a win-win-win for Ukraine, Europe, and the US defense contractors Raytheon and Lockheed Martin (who will receive licensing revenue from Ukraine and the Europeans).

(As an aside, many people don’t realize that Ukraine has a wealth of aerospace engineering talent. Back when they were part of the USSR, Ukraine was where much of the USSR’s aerospace development was concentrated. And after independence, and before Russia invaded them, Ukrainian engineering firms designed some of Russia’s missile systems under contract.)

https://dev.ua/en/news/freya-1779079793

https://www.defensenews.com/industry/techwatch/2026/07/10/zelenskyy-taps-european-allies-to-build-freya-a-cheaper-patriot-alternative-to-russias-ballistic-missiles/

(Image of the proposed Freya FP-7 anti-ballistic missile. Credit: Firepoint Rocket Technologies.)

7. And on the subject of delusional behavior, someone in the Russian hierarchy ordered a convoy of 8 river tankers down the Don River into the Sea of Azov to relieve Crimea’s oil shortages. One OSINT analyst pointed out that the port at Kerch could only accommodate two tankers at a time, and the remaining vessels had to queue up in the Sea of Azov waiting to unload their oil. For Ukraine is was like shooting fish in a barrel. All 8 tankers were disabled by drones that hit their engine rooms or their conning towers. After that first foul-up, someone in command decided to send more river tankers down to Kerch. Those were all hit and disabled. Then the Russians sent out tugs to tow the disabled tankers back to the mouth of the Don, but Ukraine started hitting the tugs. This bizarre behavior by the Russians continued all week. Six days later, 91 boats were disabled, including tankers, tugs, ferries, and some grain-hauling ships. All traffic on the Sea of Azov has ceased for now.

After day three of the tanker massacre, the milblogger with the handle Informant wrote: “Oil tanker convoys are being deployed along the same route for the third day running without any changes. Have I told you what insanity is? Insanity is repeating the same action over and over again, hoping for change. That is madness.” Two Majors noted that, “The nuance lies in the fact that the enemy footage shows not a single burst of tracer fire directed at the hostile drones from the tankers. There are no visible escort ships or patrol boats…” And Vizioner wrote, “Is such negligent behavior by the Russian Ministry of Defense—and such effective, unpunished action by the AFU in the skies over the Sea of ​​Azov—actually possible?”

I agree. What were they thinking? Throughout this conflict, Russia has had a habit of using the same strategies over and over, failing to adapt when they fail. Meanwhile, Ukraine continues to innovate, and its strategy has been steadily evolving.

The fuming of outraged Russian milbloggers can be read at the following links. (h/t to @ChrisO_wiki on X.)

https://t.me/visioner_rf/18989

https://t.me/putnik1lv/13889

https://t.me/dva_majors/95846

https://t.me/infomil_live/31617

https://t.me/osetin21/13595

https://t.me/osetin21/13599

https://t.me/svstpl/8101

https://t.me/ZOV_Voevoda/49080

https://t.me/rybar/81635

(Credit: Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces.)

(Credit: Exilenova_plus.)

8. Meanwhile, over in Omsk, 2500 km away from Ukraine, locals in the area had been reporting that UAVs were flying over the Omsk refinery. Videos were posted. Various commentators suggested that Ukraine was sending overflights to survey the site preceding an attack on the refinery. Well, Ukraine finally hit the refinery. Their augmented FP-1 drones had to travel over 2,500 km from the Ukrainian border. I think this is a new distance record for long-range drones, especially since they often have to take circuitous routes to avoid detection.

Milbloggers were outraged that even with the attack clearly being imminent, the Russian authorities refused to allocate any AA systems to protect the plant. Instead, Russia sent its newest Su-57 fighter jet out to intercept the FP-1s. Reportedly, it shot down one of the enhanced FP-1 drones. But at least two others, and possibly more, got through. Analysts at the Dnipro Osint group reported that the FP-1 drones struck the ELOU-AVT-11 unit at the Gazpromneft-ONPZ Omsk Oil Refinery. To decode that statement, ELOU (Russian ЭЛОУ) refers to the Electrodehydration and Desalting unit, and AVT means Atmospheric-Vacuum Tubular. The ELOU purifies raw crude oil by removing water and mineral salts. And the AVT subjects the purified oil to extreme heat under atmospheric and vacuum pressures to separate it into fractions such as gasoline, diesel, kerosene, and fuel oil. The drones didn’t hit the cracking unit, though. Well, that will have to wait for a follow-up strike.

The Omsk refinery is one of Russia’s largest refineries, and can process 8.4 million tonnes of crude oil per year. Also, it’s the only site that produces cracking catalysts for other Russian refineries. Only one remaining refinery of Russia’s ten largest refineries hasn’t been hit yet, and that’s way over in Irkutsk. Ukraine doesn’t have any drones that reach that far. Yet.

(Omsk refinery strike locations. Credit: Dnipro Osint.)

(Russian Su-57 fighter. Credit: Russian Ministry of Defense.)

Most of the firms that could replace this equipment are not Russian companies and would be forbidden from doing so under sanctions. Honeywell UOP, Technip Energies, Lummus Technology, Shell Catalysts & Technologies. Russia has been fairly successful in bypassing sanctions, but obtaining replacement components, catalysts, control systems, and specialized alloys will be much more difficult. Sanctions probably won’t prevent the repairs from happening, but they’ll slow the process because the equipment will have to come in via circuitous routes.

(Moscow’s oil refinery burning in June. It doesn’t look like Ukraine hit the cracking tower, at least on that strike.)

2. According to the Ukrainian General Staff, as of the end of June, 42.74 percent of Russia’s refining capacity was offline. I would have expected this estimate to be higher, since something like 10 of Russia’s 13 largest refineries have been hit. Maybe some of the cracking towers are still functioning — plus Russia has another 30 or so smaller refineries.

(Source: General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.)

3. Russia is now exporting its crude to India (at heavily discounted prices), and reimporting refined petroleum products. At its peak, Russia was refining 6.6 million barrels per day. The amount reportedly coming back to Russia from India is around 500 thousand barrels (which would be less than 20 percent of its deficit, even if it could reach that inflow on a daily basis). According to another analyst, India should be able to deliver up to 400 thousand tons of refined oil to Russia each month. However, Russia’s daily consumption is 110 thousand tons (not sure how that translates into barrels).

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/indias-russian-oil-imports-hit-record-high-june-data-shows-2026-06-30/

https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/India-Denies-Directly-Exporting-Fuel-to-Russia-But-Admits-Traders-May-Be.html

4. And right on cue, Ukraine struck Russia’s largest oil transshipment facility in Leningrad Oblast.

5. Long-range Russian UAVs launched against Ukraine declined in June, while Ukraine launched twice the number against Russian targets. Strikes at various plants that supply electronics and assemble drones may be affecting the balance of terror (except that Ukraine is mostly avoiding civilian targets while the Russians seem to be wasting theirs on civilian targets).

(Source: Ukrainian MoD.)

6. Gas lines are getting longer and longer. Cars are running out of fuel before reaching gas stations. Numerous videos of fights breaking out over gasoline are appearing on X and TikTok. Here’s aerial video posted on 2 July of a heckuva-long gas line near Chita (in Zabaykalsky Krai, in the Transbaikal region of Russia’s Far East).

7. Some enterprising Russian soul created a crowdsourcing site called “где бензин” – (“Where is Gasoline?”) to show the availability of fuel at gas stations across Russia. But Ukrainians started logging into it and changing fuel station statuses, marking empty stations as supplied and supplied stations as empty.

8. Ukrainian journalist Dmytro Karpanko, citing Russian governmental sources, warned that Putin intends to mobilize 500,000 troops immediately after the elections, followed by a nationwide internet shutdown five days later (elections are scheduled for September). This was echoed around social media sites, and the rumor mill has increased the mobilization quota to 750,000. Equipping and deploying such a large number of troops would probably take several months. So, Russia has another four or five months of hell until Putin can launch his final push to crush Ukraine. You’d think he’d have a greater sense of urgency since Ukraine is quickly bringing the country to a standstill.

9. Former Wagner Group commander-turned-milblogger who goes by the callsign Khrust says that a secret order from the Council of Ministers has been relayed to the Republic of Crimea instructing them to prepare reserves of supplies in case of an evacuation. Another source confirmed that a partial evacuation plan for government agencies, various institutions, and the population has been drawn up, affecting up to 250,000 people. One commentator said, “It remains to be seen whether it will be implemented and to what extent. The question of housing such a number of people has not yet been resolved.” But the Ukrainian partisan group Atesh reports that the Russians have begun evacuating officials of the occupation government as well as military equipment. Russia also claims it is preparing for a possible landing of Ukrainian troops on the peninsula...

Note: my previous Substack posts have focused on developments in warfare, but warfare is ultimately an expression of minds in conflict (i.e., chess games with high-energy pieces). Wars come and go, and minds continue to exist (for now at least).

1. In “Direct effect of genetic ancestry on complex traits in a Mexican population,” by Siqi Wang, et al., the authors in this study of sampled an admixed population (of Indigenous Americans, Europeans, Africans, and East Asians, in Mexico City), and they quantified associations between genetic ancestry and 15 complex traits among n=52,583 unrelated individuals, and n=39,714 relatives across 17,627 families. The reason I found this study interesting is that they failed to find any correlation between ancestry and educational attainment.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.09.25335237v1.full.pdf

The researchers found that height and the frequency of Type 2 Diabetes are strongly correlated with ancestry — but, get this — they “found no evidence for a direct effect of ancestry on educational attainment or other study traits despite large and significant associations at the population level implying environmental causes or confounding.” It shows that when you remove the between-family sources of confounding, the genetic influence on educational attainment drops to zero. In other words, they found no signal that educational attainment is heritable.

This paper got a lot of pushback from the HBDers on X. If I understood their argument, they still considered the population sample of admixed adults in the Mexico City Prospective Study (MCPS) to be highly segregated, because ancestry variation between families stands at SD = 0.167, and is far larger than ancestry variation among siblings within a family: SD = 0.020. So this is strong evidence for ancestry-based assortative mating — i.e., individuals with relatively high Indigenous American (IAM) ancestry tend to mate with others who also have relatively high IAM ancestry, and individuals with relatively high European ancestry tend to mate with others who also have relatively high European ancestry. And they argued that Mexico City may be some sort of outlier to the rest of Mexico.

Overall, the population in the Mexico City sample remains highly admixed compared to, say, North American populations. As a comparison, admixture between whites and blacks in the US follows a different pattern. White Americans tend to have > 95% European ancestry, while Black Americans have 10-30% European ancestry — with comparatively fewer people in the middle. I’d be curious what we’d find if we ran a similar study in, say, São Paulo, Brazil (which has higher rates of admixture than the US, because, unlike the US, Brazil never implemented rigid legal barriers to intermarriage — such as the “one-drop rule” and anti-miscegenation laws).

Anyway, the best predictor of educational attainment was socio-economic status. With the caveat that the population in this study (residents of Mexico City) may not reflect the patterns seen in other parts of Mexico or the rest of the world.

2. We’ve known for several decades that brain function and structure are affected by environmental conditions. The results of the Mexico City study make more sense in light of this study, “Patterns of brain-wide associations reflect socioeconomics” (by Scott Marek et al.), which “mapped brain-wide association studies (BWAS) of 649 phenotypes and exposures to brain function and structure using imaging data from many sources. Across adolescents, neighborhood-level socioeconomics showed the strongest brain-wide association, representing a single exposome pattern that explains 34% of all BWAS variance. In their datasets, the classic brain-IQ association largely disappeared when socioeconomic status was properly accounted for. These results provide valuable insights for understanding the effects of the environment on brain development” (from the editorial summary by Mattia Maroso).

One of the interesting conclusions that the authors found is that the known motor and sensory effects of sleep deprivation and stress on developing brains are correlated with poorer ZIP codes — although they wrote that higher-order cognitive regions of the frontal and parietal cortices didn’t show this. Not sure what they meant by this, since they showed that socioeconomic status correlates with proxies for IQ.

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aee6213

3. The 11 June edition of The Atlantic published a controversial article entitled “The Mirage of the Gifted Child.” The author wrote: “When your intelligence is the foundation of your self-perceptions, failing to achieve feels like soul death.” Unfortunately, the article is behind a paywall, but the summary blurb says that with “the limited amount of information we have about gifted kids long-term is any indication, most lead, at best, ordinary lives of modest accomplishment. A 35-year study of 677 gifted children found that by age 50, only 12.3 percent had reached a level of ‘eminence,’ defined as ‘full professors … Fortune 500 executives … judges and lawyers, leaders in biomedicine, award-winning journalists and writers.’ This means 88 percent never did.”

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/gifted-talented-intelligence-public-schools-testing.html

Matthew Yglesias commented on X, “What kind of debunking is this? That is a very high rate of eminence!!” I agree that this is an extremely high rate of eminence, and the authors did a shitty job of debunking the myth of eminence. If they had really understood the shortcomings of the original study, they could have done a better job debunking it.

Katie Arnold-Ratliff referenced the 2019 paper, “Psychological Constellations Assessed at Age 13 Predict Distinct Forms of Eminence 35 Years Later” by Brian O. Bernstein, David Lubinski, and Camilla P. Benbow.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330717934_Psychological_Constellations_Assessed_at_Age_13_Predict_Distinct_Forms_of_Eminence_35_Years_Later

My immediate reaction to this paper was that the rates of eminence were higher than those reported by Lewis Terman’s study of geniuses, which tracked n=1528 across their lifetimes. I no longer have access to the final summary by the Terman team, Volume V: The Gifted Group at Mid-Life: Thirty-five Years’ Follow-up of the Superior Child (1959), but IIRC, Terman’s termites showed lower rates of eminence that were more in line with the general population. However, Team Terman had a somewhat higher standard of eminence than Bernstein et al did (award-winning scientists and mathematicians, people who filed groundbreaking patents, influential legal minds, etc.)/

So, my first problem with studies of eminence is that there’s no universally accepted standard of eminence. Be that as it may, the Bernstein study suffers from other shortcomings.

The biggest problem with their study is its selection bias. The sample was not representative of the general population. Participants were already selected from the top roughly 1% of cognitive ability, as measured by SMPY. And many came from families that were willing and able to participate in talent searches. At least, Terman’s team’s selection criteria were simply anyone with an IQ score of 135 or higher. My understanding is that most SMPY participants are already enrolled in gifted programs at high-performing secondary schools, whereas Terman selected his subjects from a population that predated gifted programs (albeit most were from middle- to upper-class backgrounds in the San Francisco Bay Area). As a result, the Bernstein findings tell us about differences within a preselected group of gifted youths, not about the origins of eminence in the population as a whole, let alone eminence in a randomly selected population of high-IQ subjects.

4. In “Could a Neuroscientist Understand a Microprocessor?” (by Eric Jonas and Konrad Paul Kording), an electrical engineer and a neuroscientist ask the question: could a neuroscientist understand a microprocessor? Spoiler alert: their answer is ‘no.’ Microprocessors are complex systems that we understand in extreme detail. If we didn’t, could we discover this knowledge using the scientific methods we use to interrogate brains? In an interestingly designed and entertainingly written paper, the author shows how inadequate our methods to uncover how the brain works are.

From the abstract…
> we take a classical microprocessor as a model organism, and use our ability to perform arbitrary experiments on it to see if popular data analysis methods from neuroscience can elucidate the way it processes information. Microprocessors are among those artificial information processing systems that are both complex and that we understand at all levels, from the overall logical flow, via logical gates, to the dynamics of transistors. We show that the approaches reveal interesting structure in the data but do not meaningfully describe the hierarchy of information processing in the microprocessor. This suggests current analytic approaches in neuroscience may fall short of producing meaningful understanding of neural systems…

https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005268&type=printable

5. Finally, I came across this interesting article, “Formalizing the Heritability Fallacy” by a person who goes by the handle RaceRealist on X. The author uses formal logic to cast shade on the hereditarian arguments. I’m not sure the HBDers will be swayed by philosophical arguments. And I don’t need formal logic to support a position that I’ve come by just looking at the data (but it’s nice to know that it can be done). However, this person has greater familiarity with the nature-vs-nurture literature (and a deeper understanding of the history of the controversy) than I do. I’ve dipped into several other of RaceRealist’s posts and have found myself lured down Internet rabbit holes.

https://notpoliticallycorrect.me/2025/12/24/formalizing-the-heritability-fallacy/

What’s interesting to me is that on the 60 Minut (60 Minutes) TV show, Olga Skabeyeva, one of the leading propagandists on Russian State TV, accused Novak of lying. Her co-host (and husband) Yevgeny Popov didn’t blink. She may be setting up the Good-Tzar-Bad-Boyar narrative, but the fact that she explicitly said there was a fuel problem shows that the situation is starting to leak past the censors.

(Novak lying and Skabeyeva calling him a liar)

2. On 24 June, Alexander Lukashenko met with the Russian ambassador, Boris Gryzlov, and Andrei Vorobyov, the Moscow Region Governor. He urged Russia not to drag Belarus into a war with Ukraine. By expressing this, Lukashenko publicly confirmed a leak from last week that Gryzlov (on Putin’s behalf) has been pushing Minsk toward more active involvement in the hostilities. The Wall Street Journal, citing former and current Russian and European officials, reported that since the beginning of the year, Moscow has been pressuring Belarus to secure permission to use the country as a launchpad in the war or for hybrid operations against NATO countries.) Addressing Gryzlov by his patronymic, Lukashenko said, “Don’t push us here toward what Boris Vyacheslavovich is organizing—a process to drag us into the war,” he said. “So let’s, guys, negotiate.”

Video of Lukashenko’s statement was shared by Belarusian state media. Lukashenko also stated that he had met with representatives that President Zelenskyy sent to Minsk. You’ll remember that on 19 June, Zelenskyy publicly called for Lukashenko to remove the Russian communication repeaters from Belarusian territory within a week. These Russian drone repeater stations are installed along Belarus's southeastern border. Zelenskyy threatened to take them out if Belarus didn’t take them down. Although Belarus didn’t announce they had turned them off, on Tuesday, 24 June, Zelenskyy stated that the repeaters were no longer operational. Russian drones had stopped flying into Ukraine from along the Belarusian-Ukrainian border.

Lukashenko also asked the Russians, “How can we fight against Ukrainians with territorial defense troops…?” Lukashenko has between 45,000 and 65,000 regular troops at his disposal, and he can call up about 300,000 reservists. But they don’t have any combat experience, and I’m unclear how well-equipped they are. Lukashenko also noted that Moscow Oblast accounts for about $15 billion in trade with Belarus. He stated that if there is anything Belarus can do to help, "we will definitely work together and do everything" to assist. He reaffirmed that both sides are "making progress" and emphasized, "As for our economic plans, we will certainly continue to implement them". The WSJ says Belarus is supplying Russia with gasoline and other petroleum products amid shortages caused by Ukrainian attacks. My understanding was that Belarus refines the heavily discounted crude oil they receive from Russia, primarily via the Druzbha pipeline. The pipeline is operational again after Ukraine struck it. I’m not sure how much refined gasoline products Belarus can ship back to Russia.

(Lukashenko meeting with the Russian ambassador and the governor of Moscow Oblast.)

3. Immediately after meeting the Russian representatives, Lukashenko was invited to visit Putin’s residence in Valdai. The meeting was announced after the fact. He stayed overnight in Valdai, but there has been no official comment about what was discussed, nor have photos of the two leaders meeting been released. This suggests that Putin was unable to get his way with Lukashenko. Lukashenko then flew off to China to meet Xi Jinping. The visit was organized with unprecedented speed for China, where he was personally received by Xi Jinping.

According to Anton Gerashchenko on X, “The Chinese leader emphasized support for Belarus’s sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity. Formally, this is a standard diplomatic formula. But in the current circumstances, it can be read as a signal: Beijing is declaring a protectorate over Belarus and indicating that it has its own interests there. And we know what those interests are - Belarus is a major producer of potash fertilizers, an important logistical hub between Russia and Europe, and part of the overland routes of Chinese trade.” Gerashchenko concluded, “As of now, it looks as though Lukashenko has rejected Putin’s demands to involve Belarus even more deeply in the war with Ukraine and has turned to Beijing for protection.”

(Lukashenko’s meeting with Xi)

3. Ukraine struck two more Russian oil refineries this past weekend: the Slavyansky refinery in Krasnodar Krai and the Yaroslavl refinery (a couple of hundred kilometers beyond Moscow). Gasoline shortages and rationing are now endemic throughout Russia (including the Far East). Russian media reports indicate that the Omsk refinery is Russia’s only strategic oil refinery operating at full capacity after the strike. Ten out of thirteen refineries are either non-operational or operating at much-diminished capacity. The Omsk refinery, which is several hundred kilometers east of the Urals, has remained unscathed. And the Komsomolsk and the Khabarovsk refineries in the far east are still operating. The Omsk refinery is likely now within reach of Ukrainian strikes. Expect to see it hit soon.

4. Both the Dubna Space Communications Center and the Vladimir Space Communications Center were taken out of service by precision strikes by Ukrainian FP-5 Flamingo cruise missiles. Satellite imagery confirmed damage to the main parabolic antennas, roof antennas, and technical buildings. I haven’t seen any analysis of how this will affect Russia’s satellite communications, but it can’t be good. Ukraine’s MoD also said it had hit a plant producing electronics for missiles in Russia’s Voronezh region. Videos of the attack showed that 4 of the 5 Flamingos launched by Ukraine evaded Russian air defenses and struck the plant. According to the MoD, the ​Voronezh facility manufactured critical components used in Russia’s Iskander tactical missile systems. Voronezh Regional Governor Alexander Gusev, writing on Telegram, described the facility as “an industrial enterprise on the left bank of the Voronezh River in the provincial capital. We ​have sustained extremely heavy losses today. As a result of a missile attack ​on the city, five people were killed,” Gusev said. “Several dozen citizens sought medical help, but ‌most were ⁠sent home after receiving treatment.” The plant was hit during daylight hours, and local bloggers suggest that the casualties were much higher. Several hundred workers may have been injured or died in the attack.

5. As an aside, I noticed that various regional governors are distributing their announcements over Telegram again (despite the ban) after Apple removed Max from its global App Store to comply with sanctions regulations. Max is Russia’s state-backed social media app, and the only social media app that people are supposed to use. The delisting of Max prevents iOS users from downloading or updating the application. Apple also disabled push notifications for incoming messages and calls. This has affected approximately 20 million iPhone users in Russia. And most of the elites use iPhones.

6. A Ukrainian commentator on X who goes by the handle Serg noted that if you map recent Flamingo targets, they are located along the Volga and Kama rivers. The Flamingos are flying under Russian radar along the river valleys to reach their targets. Flying close to water can confuse radar by reflections, and following river courses may simplify navigation.

(Map by Serg.)

7. Russian retail outlets are running out of gasoline cans, siphons, hoses, and pumps. The Russian search engine Yandex shows a spike in queries of “бензин” (i.e., benzin, a.k.a., gasoline). Likewise the searches for how to siphon gasoline are also spiking.

(source, Meduza.)

8. The partisan group Atesh reports that, due to the drone attacks against logistics, panic is spreading in the pro-Russian administration led by Vladimir Saldo in occupied Kherson. They are worried that Ukraine will soon compromise the escape routes for officials. The partisan group says it is possible that the occupation administration will soon be forced to decamp to the Zaporizhzhia region via Melitopol, which is farther from the front line and is considered the main evacuation route. Atesh was correct in their assessment that Russians were abandoning the Kinburn Spit (they did, and Ukrainian armed forces have now occupied it without a fight). And Atesh was correct that the Black Sea Fleet command would abandon Sevastopol for the mainland port city of Novorossiysk (they did). Atesh seems to have good sources in the occupation governments and military groups, so I pay attention to what they say.

(Vladimir Saldo in less stressful times.)

9. And depending on who you listen to, there is a traffic jam that’s ten, fifteen, or twenty kilometers long trying to exit Crimea over the Kerch Bridge. Anyway, it’s a long line of cars. Each has to be inspected for explosives before they’re allowed to cross the bridge. And the bridge is shut down whenever drones approach (which I gather is frequently). I bet a lot of cars run out of fuel while they’re waiting to cross. I’d be interested in what the authorities are doing, if anything, to move stalled cars out of the line.

10. Oleg Kryuchkov, a senior official in the administration of occupied Crimea, explained why they’re not turning on air raid sirens. The justification he gave is that sounding the alarms would destroy the residents’ mental health. Because of the continuous drone attacks, the sirens would be wailing for 20 to 22 hours every day.

11. And in other drone news, Taiwan has just unveiled a plan to invest $6.4 billion in drone defenses, reportedly to make any invasion attempt too costly for Beijing. They plan to purchase and/or manufacture 210,000 drones of various types. As I’ve said before, despite Chinese bluster, I don’t expect an invasion of Taiwan anytime soon. Xi removed the two top PLA officers (sympathetic to the old guard and who opposed an invasion of Taiwan), and two important second-level officers (Xi appointees) were purged last month. AFAIK none of these positions has been filled yet. In the past, the Chairman could appoint whomever he wanted to senior PLA positions, but the Central Committee has established a commission with representatives from Xi’s faction and his opponents to approve new appointments. I don’t think they’ve filled those top positions yet, which to my mind makes an invasion of Taiwan very unlikely since the PLA is effectively rudderless right now. So Taiwan has some breathing space to build up its drone defenses.

https://www.forum-militaire.fr/taiwan-projette-de-noyer-le-ciel-avec-une-armada-de-plus-de-210-000-drones-en-cas-dattaque-chinoise-en-conformite-avec-sa-doctrine-de-bouclier-autonome/

And Ukraine got past Moscow’s layered air defenses — not once, but twice! — to strike the Kapotnya oil refinery on 16 and 18 June. The refinery, owned by Gazprom-Neft, supplies up to 40% of Moscow’s capital region’s total gasoline and diesel fuel market. More importantly, it serves as the primary jet fuel supplier for all of Moscow’s major airports.

https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-june-18-2026/

1b. Two thoughts occurred to me. First, Zelenskyy and his team no doubt timed this attack to coincide with the G7 conference in France to generate maximum publicity. Second, Zelenskyy and his team must have been pretty sure they could bypass Moscow’s air defense network to strike their targets. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have risked ending up embarrassed in front of the G7 leaders. Various commentators have suggested the attack caused unease rather than pleasure in some European circles because it showed how powerful Ukraine has become. According to this line of reasoning, Germany and Poland look weaker, while France looks stronger (because of Macron’s unrestrained support for Ukraine). Likewise, it may further delay Ukraine joining the EU and NATO/OTAN because, again, Ukraine would play an outsized role if it joined. But these are all the opinions of talking heads, and the whisperings of politicians with axes to grind. It all may mean nothing in the end. But keep your antennas up for grumbling and political gamesmanship among EU members.

1c. From the military side of the equation, Clément Molin (@clement_molin) on X says that the Ukrainian strikes on Moscow tell us several things (I quote):

> The Ukrainians have largely caught up on their lag in long-range drones

> Russian air defense is failing, we’re talking about 120 modern and well-supplied air defense systems all around the city in 4 layers, whose action is often ineffective or dangerous.

> Russian aviation is largely absent, Russian fighter jets are numerous enough to monitor the airspace, including Moscow but also other cities, and yet they are invisible.

> Moscow’s refinery was one of the most defended in the country, and since the beginning of the year, a refinery or oil depot has been hit every 3 days on average.

> Russia has more to lose than to gain in the war. The strikes on Ukraine cannot really destroy the Ukrainian economy any more than it already is, which is largely in difficulty and supported by the EU, but the strikes on Russia have almost infinite potential.

> On February 24, 2022, no one would have imagined that on June 18, 2026, Moscow would be ablaze after a 3rd consecutive night of Ukrainian strikes with drones manufactured in Ukraine.

To which I would add, no air raid sirens were heard during the Moscow. According to a video posted by a woman in the municipality of Kotelniki (near to where the Moscow oil refinery is located), residents asked where they’re supposed to shelter during a drone attack. Authorities refused to disclose the locations of bomb shelters to the residents. Officials stated that this information would be made available to residents only “during mobilization and martial law.” The local administration also stated that the authorities were not obligated to warn the public about the air threat, since “this is an extreme measure, not a routine one.”

(Moscow air-defenses as of October 2025)

https://unn.ua/en/news/the-capital-of-the-russian-federation-is-likely-surrounded-by-a-multi-layered-air-defense-system-a-map-was-shown-online

1d. What sort of drones did Ukraine use in this attack? Kyrylo Budanov said about a half-dozen different types of drones were used, including decoy drones. But he didn’t specify the models.

Russian milblogger UpGadgetRu was able to identify four different types of drones.

> AN-196 “Lyutyi”. A long-range fixed-wing kamikaze drone, developed by the Antonov Design Bureau and manufactured by Ukroboronprom. It is constructed using an integrated twin-boom design with a pusher propeller and a fiberglass body.

> FP-1. A long-range attack UAV of the aircraft type, developed by Fire Point in collaboration with the Ukrainian-Czech company UAC. It is made in a twin-boom configuration with a high-mounted straight wing, the airframe is made of composites.

> “Bars”. Long-range jet drone-missile. The fuselage has a streamlined shape to reduce air drag. The airframe is made of composite materials resistant to loads at high speeds, with a minimal use of metal.

> “Bobr”. A long-range loitering kamikaze munition manufactured by the Ukroboronprom concern using NATO technology. It is built using a canard aerodynamic configuration, which allows it to change altitude more easily and maneuver better in the air.

In addition to these, Ukraine may have used their upgraded “Chaika” long-range drone (or possibly the long-range version their SPECTRE drones) as decoys. Both have RF capabilities to confuse RuAF air defenses. Since all these types of drones have varying top air speeds, Ukraine must have timed the launches for maximum effectiveness.

Picture and specs up on UpGadgetRu’s post…

https://t.me/UpGadgetru/3187

1e. Another key question for military analysts is how many drones did Ukraine expend to get through Moscow’s air defense cordon and what percentage were successfully intercepted? Only Ukraine knows how many they sent, and they’re not saying. And they probably know how many got through from drone video feeds and post-attack satellite pics — but they’re wisely not publicizing that info, because theoretically, Russia could adjust their defense response if they knew (if they weren’t so organizationally fucked up). I suspect that the Russians aren’t making a serious effort to tabulate the numbers and types shot down vs got through because the answers to those questions would be embarrassing to the military, to the equipment manufacturers, and to the authorities. Based on the video evidence, it appears that most of the drones, once they reached the Moscow metro area, were not intercepted. From pictures and videos, I only counted 3 interceptions. We don’t know how many were lost traversing the outer ring of defenses, though. I’ve seen figures as high as 550 drones were involved each night of the attacks. Russia says it shot down a couple of hundred, in which case, Ukraine probably launched fewer than 550, because more would have gotten through. OTOH, Budanov remarked that “most got through” which would indicate that the drone swarm was much smaller than initially reported. But without Ukraine’s numbers, it’s all guesswork and/or bullshit.

1f. Shortages of gasoline in the greater Moscow area intensified. Reportedly, Russia has, for the first time in years, begun importing refined gasoline and diesel from unspecified Central Asian republics. And Russia has begun urgently transferring additional S-300/S-400 SAM batteries to Moscow, in an attempt to bolster the capital’s defenses against new attacks. Presumably, this will strip air defenses away from other facilities. But maybe the leadership has decided that some of the already-destroyed facilities no longer need protection.

(Convoy of missile systems approaching Moscow, souce t.me/karymat)

1g. The iconic photo of the lid flying off the storage tank has became a meme that spawned hundreds of parody images. A couple of my favorites below. And Ukraine’s MonoBank immediately issued a Visa card with the image.

2. The political dynamic between Belarus and Ukraine has shifted. Over the previous month, there were reports that Putin wanted Belarus to open a second front against Ukraine. Belarus has about 45,000 to 65,000 active-duty military personnel and can perhaps call up 300,000 reservists. No one considers their army to be particularly well-trained. Lukashenko, other than allowing Russia to use its territory as a staging point against Ukraine in 2022, has mostly steered clear of being drawn into Putin’s Special Military Operation. To stave off any rash actions by Lukashenko, Zelenskyy on 1 June said that Ukraine’s drone forces have identified 500 strategic targets inside Belarus.

Lukashenko then apologized to Zelensky for his harsh statements (calling him a drug-addled criminal on several occasions) he’d made in the past. “If Vladimir Alexandrovich was offended, I apologize to him for those words. Maybe I shouldn’t have said them, given that he is still at war. Moreover, he perfectly understands that from Belarus, and especially from me personally, no military actions should be expected.” He continued: “Belarus (we understand this, which is why we do not want to fight) is very vulnerable militarily if Ukraine starts attacking Belarus the same way it attacks Russia. Because Belarus is like an open book to Ukrainian military forces. We fully understand that our main life-supporting facilities — industrial and logistical — will come under attack. As they stated, they already have 500 such targets planned on Belarusian territory.

Lukashenko obviously wants to distance himself from that situation that he sees occurring in the occupied territories and now spreading to Russia.

Zelenskyy, then upped the ante on Friday…

“On his territory, along two regions bordering Ukraine, there is equipment that adjusts fire on the Ukrainian population. They are killing civilians there. There are repeaters on the corresponding towers. Can he take it down? Why say that he doesn’t want to be in the war? Let him take down this equipment. Let him turn off this equipment.”

”I think that a week will be enough for him to do this.”

“If he doesn’t do it, we will.”

This morning Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov confirmed that Putin will discuss the Ukrainian ultimatum to dismantle the drone relay stations in Belarus with Lukashenko. The fact that the Kremlin is officially confirming the issue at all is surprising. The Kremlin has been forced to acknowledge Kyiv’s ultimatum in the face of a threat to their putative ally (Belarus). And Ukraine feels confident enough to provoke a military response from Lukashenko if the worst happens.

(Lukashenko in a recent interview of Belarusian TV)

3. This weekend, Ukraine struck an oil refinery and/or an oil storage site in the city of Kerch, the Chuska oil terminal on the Russian side of the strait, and three gas compressor facilities on the peninsula. They also struck four S-400 and two Pantsir S1 anti-aircraft systems that were positioned on the Kerch bridge. But they didn’t try to take down the bridge. Paul Warburg and other analysts suggest that Ukraine intends to leave at least one lane on the bridge open as an exit for civilians and military (should the RuAF decide to abandon Crimea). As it is the Kerch Bridge can only handle an estimated 20 percent of its pre-war traffic. The Russians aren’t letting any heavy vehicles drive across it. Consensus is that the three previous strikes have left it structurally weakened. After the attack, Russia closed off the bridge (probably for inspection). Traffic leaving Crimea, much of it civilians exiting the war zone, was backed up several kilometers.

The ferry Panagia was also hit, and a video showed two other ships burning in the waters of the strait. Open sources have documented that the Panagia is primarily used to transport military equipment, such as S-300/S-400 missile systems, across the strait to Crimea. The Russians must now reroute trucks down the highway of death, from Rostov to Mariupol and Melitopol.

(Note: After Moscow and Putin’s residence in Valai, the Kerch Strait Bridge and surrounding area reportedly have the highest concentration of air defense systems.)

(The burning oil depot at Kerch, source Exilenova+)

(Satellite photo of the burning facility, source EU Copernicus Sentinel.)

4. The Russian occupation governor of Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov, announced that all fuel sales in the territory have been suspended, with only government agencies receiving vouchers to purchase gas. Electricity has gone out in Sevastopol, Alushta, Krasnoperekopsk, Armyansk, and Novaya Yal’ta. There are also problems with mobile communication and water, according to local bloggers. Sources inside Ukraine’s MoD estimate that Crimea has about a 30-day supply of food on hand.

(Sergey Aksyonov announcing the suspension of all fuel sales in Crimea.)

All possible remedies for the situation are being considered…

(source Diana Vonlanthen)

5. Speaking of food, Farmers in Russia’s Irkutsk Region are facing a potentially disastrous agricultural season. Fuel shortages and rising costs are threatening bankruptcies. Those farmers who can get diesel complain that the price has doubled. The harvest may be threatened. Local farmers note that at current fuel costs, grain production becomes completely unprofitable. The response of local authorities was to ban discussion of this problem on social media.

Before the media blackout went into effect, regional MP and agriculture executive Stepan Sergeyevich Frantenko warns: “We might as well just shut down in advance and not waste hundreds of millions, but simply prepare for the complete closure of the entire agriculture sector of the Irkutsk region. Yes, it sounds terrifying, it sounds unpleasant, but a fact remains a fact.”

6. After being missing in action for two weeks, Elvira Nabiullina, the head of Russia’s central bank, made a public appearance at a 19 June press conference. There was speculation that she was under house arrest or worse. When asked her absence, she said, “I can only confirm that I did indeed have a cold. I lost my voice for a time. And the only thing I can say is to thank those who were genuinely concerned about my health,”

(Elvira Nabiullina at her press conference.)

https://meduza.io/en/news/2026/06/19/russia-s-central-bank-head-nabiullina-makes-first-public-appearance-since-early-june

7. To wrap things up, Ukraine’s MoD has announced TrophyLab, where they’ll put everything they’ve learned about Russian military equipment online. Their announcement:

> “Ukraine launches TrophyLab: we are opening access to captured Russian weapon technologies for our global partners. Every missile, drone, and vehicle seized on the battlefield is now a source of knowledge for the free world.”

> “Through this secure platform, allied governments, labs, and defense tech manufacturers gain access to deep technical data, reports, and vulnerabilities. Users can also request physical equipment for testing, significantly shortening the development cycle for countermeasures.”

TrophyLab will provide free access to the technical specifications, blueprints, and test results for Russian weapon technologies to foreign governments, research institutions, and the defense industries. And, if requested, they will send physical hardware to allies for examination. The website includes listings for all the types of equipment Ukraine has encountered during the war, including the specifications for vehicles, tanks, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, aircraft, UAVs, EW assets, UGVs, etc.

trophylab.mod.gov.ua/en/

(Cool stuff from TrophyLab.)

1. On Monday, 1 June, President Zelenskyy said in an evening address to the Ukrainian nation that nearly 40% of Russia’s oil refineries are out of service. Ukraine struck a total of 15 refineries from January through May. “For a country that, until very recently, was called a gas station, losing even that is a significant story, a significant loss,” Zelenskyy quipped.

Many refineries have been hit multiple times, and Ukraine frequently waits until repairs are underway to hit them again. And so far in June, I’ve counted 5 more refinery strikes, including two in Tatarstan (the Taneco and Taif-NK oil refineries located in the city of Nizhnekamsk, located about 1200 km from Ukraine). A video from the Taneco strike showed that at least 3, and possibly 4, FP-1 drones struck the refinery. In the video, we hear that several shots were fired at the drones, but they didn’t sound like the automatic weapons of air defense systems to me.

(The Taneco oil refinery burning — Photo by Telegram channel/Supernova+)

According to The Economist, Ukrainian Defense Forces are now focusing on complex “secondary” targets at Russian oil refineries that are actually responsible for converting crude oil into gasoline and diesel, rather than storage and transport facilities. Because of sanctions, it’s much harder for Russia to get spare parts for repairs. According to the Ukraine General Staff, as of late May, 10 refineries were forced offline for a month, while 6 have completely halted operations (I can’t quite make these numbers jibe with Zelenskyy’s totals, but they’re in the ballpark).

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/76530

Ukraine’s campaign against Russia’s refining infrastructure has severely impacted Russia’s fuel production, forcing the Kremlin to implement export bans on gasoline and aviation fuel to mitigate the deepening energy crisis. Russia is still exporting crude oil, but output has fallen off by about 400,000 barrels per day since the beginning of this year.

(Source, The Economist.)

2. Gasoline shortages have started to spread to other regions of Russia outside the occupied territories. According to Novaya Gazeta, domestic fuel shortages have forced Russia’s largest oil networks to implement rationing protocols for “automotive fuel across its primary economic hubs, including Moscow and St. Petersburg.”

For instance, Tatneft (PJSC Tatneft) is one of the largest vertically integrated oil and gas companies in Russia, but due to its TANECO refinery being hit, Tatneft stations are refusing to dispense more than 20 liters of AI-92 and AI-95 gasoline, and limiting diesel to 40 liters per vehicle. Tatneft has extended these restrictions to all its ~850 service stations across Russia, with the majority in the Republic of Tatarstan (where its company HQ is located), over 170 serving the capital region of Moscow and Moscow Oblast, and about 75 Neste-branded service stations in Saint Petersburg and Leningrad Oblast. Plus dozens of others scattered over central and northwest Russia.

Two other industry giants, Rosneft and Lukoil, have reportedly introduced similar purchasing restrictions in Moscow and St. Petersburg

(Russian republics with fuel shortages — Source, Malcontent News.)

3. Some oil is still getting across to Crimea on barges. Although the three giant railroad barges were put out of commission, smaller barges can carry two or three tanker trucks at a time across the Kerch Strait. Authorities are not allowing tanker trucks or military trucks across the Kerch Strait Bridge. The general consensus is that Ukraine’s earlier strikes on the bridge weakened its structural integrity, since the ban has been in place well before Ukraine started the current drone campaign against Crimea. The same consensus view is that Russia will not begin sending tanker trucks and military equipment across the Kerch Bridge despite the urgency of getting gasoline and munitions into the occupied territories. We’ll see.

4. Phillips P O’Brien, in an interview with Vladyslav Urubkov, a military division lead, about Ukraine’s mid-range drone strategy. Urubkov said (I’m paraphrasing, except where quoted) is that the strategy Ukrainian Special Services has been to identify and target anti-aircraft systems since the beginning of the 2022 war. He said that Ukraine is destroying them at a rate faster than Russia can replace them or train new operators. Urubkov said that in 2022 Russia had one of the best anti-aircraft defense networks in the world, but they’ve lost hundreds of them because even the best systems can’t deal with drone swarms. “Of course, they can shoot down some of them, a couple of them, three, but if we use ten, we can reach it.” And individual drone operators have a choice of drones with different capabilities and warheads to choose from depending on the mission. They trained to operate all the current models.

5. According Robert “Madyar” Brovdi, head of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, drone forces will grow from 2.5% to 5% of the army. Ukraine intends to create drone units in all regular army units. Vladyslav Urubkov (above) threw out the number that their budget is around €100 million. According to Madyar’s unit data: In the first five months of 2026, drone forces killed 50,900 Russian soldiers and hit 176,500 targets — 337 soldiers per day. Average cost to kill one Russian soldier: $918. Drone units are 2.5% of Ukraine’s forces and caused one-third of all Russian losses.

(Is it just me, or does Brovdi look like Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top?)

6. Ukrainian forces have now confirmed destruction of all major bridges linking Crimea to Kherson Oblast.

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2026/06/11/ukrainian-strikes-damage-several-bridges-linking-occupied-kherson-with-annexed-crimea-a92979

(Map by Phillips P. O’Brien with red X’s by me showing the latest strikes.)

Satellite imagery showed that the Russians quickly installed a pontoon bridge connecting Crimea to Chongar. Dozens of trucks were waiting their turn to cross toward Kherson Oblast, with no vehicles traveling in the opposite direction toward Crimea. Crossing the pontoon bridge is slower, and the trucks began to back up. When the line of waiting trucks reached about 50, Ukraine struck the pontoon bridge and started picking off the trucks. No report on how many of those trucks were destroyed, but the pontoon bridge is now out of service.

Brovdi says he intends to entirely cut off Crimea from the rest of Russia, and he hinted this is preparation for larger theater actions (before Russia can regroup and train the next batch of conscripts for the meat grinder).

(Satellite photos of the Chongar bridges.)

7. According to the Crimean partisan group Atesh (which means “Fire” in the Crimean Tartar language), resupply issues have forced the Russians to abandon the small Kinburn Peninsula. The reports come from leaks within the Russian Dnepr grouping. The retreat from the Kinburn Spit confirms the severe disruption of Russian logistics chains. This would have been a painful strategic choice for Russian forces, because the Kinburn Peninsula controls the Dneiper River estuary, and river traffic to and from Ukrainian-held Kherson city is blocked. Russians had electronic warfare installations and drone launching sites stationed there, and that leaves a gap in Russian defenses that Ukraine can presumably exploit.

(The Kinburn Peninsula pinned — source, Google Maps.)

8. According to Chuck Pfarrer’s Indications & Warnings, the Russian Black Sea Fleet command has decided to evacuate Sevastopol. Sources inside the Russian Navy and Atesh report that officers have already begun moving families and property before any official order has been issued.

(Black Sea Fleet HQ after a Storm Shadow/SCALP missile hit it in 2023.)

9. Ukrainian FP-5 Flamingos hit a key Russian guidance-systems plant in Cheboksary, Chuvashia, Russia. Cheboksary is about 1900 km from Ukraine. What’s interesting about this target is the extensive cope cage they built around the plant. This would work against FPV drones, but it wouldn’t protect it from cruise missiles. Did they think that Ukraine would hit them with FPVs from 1900 km away? Maybe this was erected after Operation Spider Web, where FPVs were snuck into the country and launched locally.

Ukraine launched five Flamingos. They tracked them until they reached the target. Notice that they did a zigzag crossing over into Russian territory, and then they flew in a straight line without interference past Cheboksary. Then they looped around to hit the plant from the east. Two Flamingos were taken out by anti-air systems as they approached Cheboksary. Three hit the plant.

(Screen grabs of the Cheboksary plant’s cope cage and how ineffective it was from an Exilenova Plus video.)

(Path of the Flamingo FP-5s — source, Ukraine MoD?)

10. Putin’s advisor Yuri Ushakov says Trump had a conversation with Putin this weekend, and he promised to put pressure on the Europeans and Ukraine during the G7 summit to accept Russian peace conditions.

11. Elvira Nabiullina, the governor of the Russian Central Bank, didn’t make an appearance at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum at the beginning of June, and she hasn’t been seen since. According to Dmitry Skorobutov, the former chief editor of news at Channel One Russia (but now living in exile in Switzerland), Nabiullina is under house arrest for pushing back on Putin’s plans to implement mass conscription. BTW, one of the items for the Russian Duma to approve (with Putin’s approval) is to forgive the loans of volunteers up to ~US$120,000. Ultimately, banks are backing those loans, and central bankers are afraid it will lead to bank failures across the country.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said her absence should not be cause for “conspiracy theories,” adding, “People get sick sometimes — there’s nothing unusual about it.” Dmitry is looking a little pale and haggard lately, though. I think he could use a long vacation in Crimea.

UPDATE: Nabiullina is supposed to appear at a press conference today.

(Elvira Nabiullina — perhaps emphasizing how low Russia’s financial reserves are now?)

12. Gasoline is still available through the black market in Crimea and the occupied territories. It’s unclear to me if retail service stations are still occasionally receiving shipments. Also, supermarkets have sold out of staples such as sugar, flour, and pasta.

IN MORE HUMOROUS NEWS (well, grimly humorous news)…

13. Some hotels in Crimea have started offering free gasoline to attract Russian tourists amid fuel shortages on the peninsula. Guests booking a 2-night stay receive 10 liters of fuel, while those staying 3 nights or more get 20 liters. How they’re obtaining that gasoline is a question that isn’t asked. But if we assume that the average car gets ~11 km/L (roughly 25 miles/gallon), that would be enough gasoline to take you 220 km. But the distance from Sevastopol to the Kerch Bridge is about 305 km. So, you’d be stuck in Crimea if you booked your stay at a Sevastopol resort. Reportedly, the Crimea Hotel Association says there are only two new bookings for every ten cancellations.

14. Residents of Crimea are putting their homes on the market. A Sevastopol real estate agent says that property prices have already collapsed by 40%. “What do I think about all this? That those who end up not buying during this period will regret it.”

It’s a buyer’s market, people! Get in while you can! (This guy reminds me a fellow who tried to sell me a time share in Florida.)

15. A video posted by a soldier in the Rostov area shows him trying to stock up on diesel fuel, but the counter clerk refuses to sell it to him. She says she “signed a document” and that she would “get sacked” if she sold him more than the allotted amount. He escalated to her manager, and she claimed he couldn’t fill the barrels on his Kamaz truck because it posed a fire hazard. She says, “There’s a hotline number. You can ring it.”

16. And poor Sergei Borisovich Zonsky. He posted a video of a Russian military fuel tanker disguised as a civilian lumber truck passing through Kerch. He either called the driver a clown or faggot (depending on the video translation). Sergei was swiftly detained by Russian security forces and accused of “exposing and discrediting Russian troops.” Russian state media later published footage of the man’s arrest and what appeared to be a forced on-camera explanation (in the 2^nd part of the video, linked below).

(Photo by Sergei Borisovich Zonsky.)

17. And finally, Brynn Tannehill speculates on what might trigger a Russian Army collapse, and what it might look like. She uses historical examples of army collapses (such as the Russian Army in 1917, the German Army in 1918, the Japanese Army's collapse in Burma in 1944, etc.) to make the case that a collapse might occur.

    The Bulwark

    What a Russian Army Collapse Might Look Like

    HEMINGWAY FAMOUSLY OBSERVED in his 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises that one goes bankrupt “gradually and then suddenly.” The same can be said of armies. Sometimes they’re routed…

    Read more

    3 months ago · 839 likes · Brynn Tannehill

> We brought the war onto your territory, and you would not have been able to cope with it without North Korea’s help. You are the first ruler of Russia to turn to Pyongyang for assistance. And today you are fully dependent on China — also for the first time in Russia’s history. You believed Ukrainians would not have the strength to defend themselves. Yet today, our people are helping our partners in the Middle East and the Gulf build their own defenses.

> Ukraine proposes to end this war. This must be done honestly, with dignity, and with guarantees that the war will not be reignited. We see that the United States is fully focused on the issue of Iran, and it would be wrong to simply wait until the war in Europe returns to the center of its attention. Ukraine proposes ending this war through direct engagement between us — and you. I am proposing a meeting… There are countries that have traditionally hosted leaders to resolve issues of war and peace. Switzerland, Türkiye, the countries of the Arab world — many are able and willing to host such a meeting.

The letter was released the same day that the St Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) opened. The entire letter is worth reading, if only to understand how good Zelenskyy is at communicating. It’s filled with lots of zingers, probably meant to discomfit Putin just before he attended the conference. Publicity and psychological warfare walking hand in hand.

https://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/vidkritij-list-prezidentu-rosijskoyi-federaciyi-vid-preziden-104769

2. Putin didn’t mention the letter in his speech, but he was asked about it in the panel discussion that followed. Putin said he had only recently reviewed Zelenskyy’s letter after Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov brought it to his attention, but he stated that he “sees no point in holding a meeting.”

Putin complained that the letter contained “elements of boorishness” and he questioned whether its purpose was to facilitate dialogue. “What is this? An attempt to organize a meeting or an attempt to create conditions in which it becomes impossible?”

He sounded a bit peevish in some of the quotes. For instance, “The author of the letter mentioned my age,” he said. “There are people who are older than me and continue to perform their duties. The main thing is efficiency and health.”

Putin said he intends to continue the Special Military Operation and take complete control of the Donbas (by the end of the year?). “All other objectives, including the denazification of Ukraine, will be resolved through negotiations. The goals of the special military operation were defined back in 2024, and they remain unchanged.”

Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a transcript of the panel discussion, so I used about half a dozen sources to piece together Putin’s remarks. Among them…

https://censor.net/en/n4006955

https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/04/europe/zelensky-putin-meeting-intl-latam

https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2026/06/05/8037958/

3. Following Putin’s rejection of Zelenskyy’s meeting proposal, Zelenskyy said, “Unfortunately, the Russian side is choosing war again -- everyone heard today’s response.” And “It was weak response. He simply doesn’t want to end the war.”

4a. Putin told a couple of whoppers during his panel discussion. In response to a reporter’s questions about the Oreshnik ballistic missile that failed to hit any military targets, Putin said that the Oreshnik attack on the garage cooperative in Bila Tserkva in the Kyiv region was intentional. He said the attack was made “to observe how the blocks fell, which was necessary for future use of the weapon,” adding, “There has never been a single combat use of the Oreshnik missile in the true sense of the word in Ukraine.”

But it’s confirmed. It was a strategic decision by Putin to target the garage with a $50 million ballistic missile. The fact that Uncle Sasha liked to tipple vodka there couldn’t sway him from his objective with humanitarian arguments. The garage had to go! (For those of you not in the loop, the Ukrainian garage owner joked that it was a strategic decision by Putin to target his garage because his Uncle Sasha had planned to drink 50 grams of vodka there. Plus, Obama was using the garage as a hideout.)

A certain panelist seems to be expressing puzzlement at Putin’s remarks.

4b. The second whopper was that Putin estimated that the Russian Army has recently occupied 2,500 square kilometers. Neutral analysts say that Russia hasn’t gained any ground recently, and, in fact, they’ve been losing ground. However, a leaked Russian MoD map shows Russian front lines in territory that’s now controlled by Ukraine. Putin seems to be living in an information bubble. But if Russian generals think they’re fighting kilometers ahead of where the front lines actually are, they could unintentionally be sending troops through Ukrainian-controlled territories thinking they’ve been pacified.

OTOH, a couple of Western analysts have pushed back on this narrative, saying they don’t trust the Ukrainian assessments and/or the OSINT community’s assessments (based on geolocated images) of the current front lines. But the fact that Russian milbloggers are freaking out about the current situation in the occupied territories makes me suspect this map is an example of vranyo (враньё) — i.e., subordinates telling a fictional story of success while bosses happily play along to avoid confronting unpleasant realities. Another phrase that might apply is Ochkovtiratelstvo (очковтирательство), which Gemini describes as a “vibrant, long-standing Soviet-era term literally means ‘rubbing dust in someone’s eyes’ or polishing the boss’s glasses. It describes the act of feeding fabricated data and fake positive reports up the corporate or government hierarchy to make things look good and keep leadership happy.”

5. Ukrainian drones struck the St. Petersburg Oil Terminal on 3 June, the same day that attendees began to arrive at St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. The oil transfer facility was set ablaze, sending plumes of black smoke billowing over the city.

Forum goers ignoring the burning oil facility in the background.

6. Also hit was the Boykiy, a frigate that was in dry dock for repairs at the Russian Navy’s Kronstadt facility (on an island west of St. Petersburg). According to Gemini, “the Boykiy is a multi-purpose warship built for coastal defense, anti-submarine warfare, and maritime patrol missions.” Reportedly, it was worth around half a billion dollars. One Western naval analyst said it would probably be unsalvageable — not because the conning tower was destroyed, but because the hull of a ship in dry dock wasn’t designed to support water pouring into it from fire hoses (I have no way of knowing if this is true, though).

The drone’s eye view of Boykiy before it was struck, courtesy of the Ukaine MoD.

The aftermath of the strike.

7. The Russian media says a couple of hundred drones were shot down. Strangely enough, I didn’t hear anti-aircraft batteries firing in any videos of the attack. ­­­­In the screen grab I took from one of the videos (link below), the soldier in the middle of the of the image is firing bursts from an automatic carbine of some sort. The soldier on the right is unarmed, but is offering moral support. A third soldier who was out of the frame was also armed, but he wasn’t bothering to fire his weapon (or he may have run out of ammunition). The people in the foreground are illegally recording the engagement. The soldier missed that drone. I don’t know who took down those other hundreds of drones, but they deserve a medal.

At the conference, Putin vowed to improve air defenses. He said that manpower, industrial resources and willpower were on Russia’s side.

8. Ukraine launched a subsequent drone attack against St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region yesterday. The Marine Thermal Engineering Research Institute, the Naval Cadet Corps in Kronstadt, and the Petergof oil depot were reportedly targeted. An ammo depot was hit, and the stored ammo cooked off for hours. Alexander Beglov, the Governor of St. Petersburg, wrote on Telegram, “On the morning of June 6, St. Petersburg was subjected to a large-scale attack by military drones. Air defense systems are in operation. In accordance with the recommendations of the Operational Headquarters, I ask St. Petersburg residents to remain indoors and not go outside. Mobile internet service may be disrupted. Further information on the elimination of the threat will be provided.”

Meanwhile, down in the occupied territories…

9. On June 3, Governor Aksyonov of Crimea halted gasoline sales to civilians. But then he clarified that people using previously purchased coupons would be able to get up to 20 liters. But no new gasoline coupons will be issued. But he ended his remarks on a happy note, stating they will try to resume sales in the coming days.

Igor Sushko, on X wrote: “Russians are buying contraband gasoline in occupied Crimea for $3.39/liter today - 250 rubles. Yesterday the cost was $2.71/liter - 200 rubles. Some of it is being brought over from Krasnodar, where it costs $0.98/liter. The fuel is being smuggled in regular passenger cars.” Long waits to cross the Kerch Bridge. All vehicles are stopped and inspected before they cross. I wonder if the Kerch guards’ pocket part of the markup.

10. But that just changed dramatically.

Overnight, Ukraine struck a major fuel storage and transshipment facility, Ust-Labinsk, Krasnodar. This was the main source of refined gasoline for Crimea and the occupied territories. The facility had the capacity to store up to 15,000 cubic meters of gasoline and diesel and it served as a key redistribution point for fuel from refineries before it is transported onward by rail and road.

Fuel rationing of 20 liters has now been imposed on the Russian side of the Black Sea in the Krasnodar and Belgorod regions.

11. Some Russians in the occupied regions are posting pictures and videos of bare supermarket shelves. Food rationing and medicine shortages coming soon to the occupied territories? There are 2.4 million people in Crimea (I don’t know how many are in the occupied territories). Call me a nervous nelly, but I see the potential for humanitarian disaster.

12. Russian military reportedly plans to seize civilian transport vehicles to replace military transport, in an effort to camouflage shipments of fuel and military goods. They would disguise logistics as bread trucks, medicine and food transport, and would forbid drivers from wearing military uniforms. But that plan may need to be updated in light of the Krasnodar strike.

13. Yesterday, Ukrainian forces also struck the strategic Chongar (aka Chonhar) Bridge — the key road link crossing the Syvash Strait near the village of Chongar. It was the eastern of two links from the mainland to Crimea and a primary Russian logistics artery for fuel, ammunition, troops, and equipment to the occupied southern territories. The Armed Forces of Ukraine confirmed it actually damaged two bridges — the Chongar and the Henichesk.

Kherson Regional Council deputy Serhii Khlan (who is a Ukrainian official) said, “The situation on the bridges: occupiers closed the Chongar bridge, traffic is stopped; the bridge connecting Henichesk and Arabat Spit is operating [with one lane open].” I don’t understand the strategic importance of the Henichesk bridge because Google Maps indicates that the road dead-ends at the village of Strilkove on the Arabat Spit.

14. I was mistaken in my previous FoW updates (on ACX) that Ukraine was using FP-1 drones to wreak havoc on the highways and byways of the occupied territories. They may be using FP-1s, but it’s their new Morrigan drone that is causing most of the kills. Named after the goddess of war, fate, and death in Irish mythology, her name means “great queen” or “phantom queen.” She manifested herself as a crow or a raven, and her presence on the battlefield was an omen of doom. Ukraine has re-manifested her as a mid-range strike drone specifically built to target and disrupt Russian logistics, supply trucks, and fuel convoys up to 300km behind enemy lines. Ukraine’s 412th Nemesis Brigade, of the Unmanned Systems Forces, is coordinating her strikes.

https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-secret-drone-morrigan-russian-highway-r280-novorossiya-mid-range-2026-6

15. Finally, I was curious about the AI used in Ukrainian drones. Most of this info I gathered using Gemini and ChatGPT so it may contain some of the inevitable LLM bullshit (and I was too lazy to go back and verify this info with the primary sources, so YMMV). According to ChatGPT, Ukraine uses NVIDIA’s Jetson Orin Nano chips in its current crop of mid-range drones. The Jetson Orin Nano can run modern vision models and juggle multiple perception tasks simultaneously. The Jetson Orin-class hardware can run lightweight YOLO models (developed by Ultralytics) at dozens of frames per second, which is sufficient for autonomous target tracking on drones. Gemini tells me that “YOLO (You Only Look Once) models are a family of fast, real-time computer vision architectures that map image pixels to bounding boxes and class probabilities in a single pass” — Say that five times fast! —“They are primarily used for object detection, image classification, segmentation, and pose estimation.” Gemini also chimes in to say, “Modules like the Jetson Orin NX or Nano are the industry standard. These credit-card-sized computers handle real-time image processing, running computer vision algorithms to identify and lock onto targets.”

ChatGPT opines that a plausible configuration for the AI-ensemble of a current Ukrainian mid-range strike drone would include a Pixhawk (or similar) flight controller, a camera, a radio control link (probably a Starlink mini terminal), a Jetson module as discussed above (or possibly an ARM computer), a lightweight neural network for vehicle recognition, tracking software, and GPS + inertial sensors.

The AI acts more like an advanced autopilot that can recognize a target, keep it centered in the image, continue attacking if communications are lost, and navigate through an RF-jammed environment. Electronic warfare has become so intense that relying entirely on a live video link is increasingly unreliable, so the trend has been toward semi-autonomous drones with onboard machine vision.

And it turns out that Ukraine has a vast horde of training data that it’s willing to share with its partners. Gemini tells me that “Ukraine’s combat dataset contains two million hours (equivalent to 228 years) of frontline video footage and millions of annotated frames. Gathered from tens of thousands of combat flights, this information repository—which grows by 5 to 6 terabytes daily—is officially the world’s first open library of real battlefield AI training data.”

The dataset includes, footage of Russian personnel, troop movements, and camouflaged positions; data on active enemy hardware, including tanks and specialized launchers; tens of millions of specific, annotated frames showing varying weather conditions, lighting, and terrain. All of it cataloged and annotated. My understanding is that, unless they got from Ukraine’s partners, the US doesn’t have this yet, because Trump refused Ukraine’s assistance.

https://cepa.org/article/ukraines-world-beating-combat-library-opens-for-business/

https://mod.gov.ua/en/news/ukraine-is-the-first-country-in-the-world-to-open-real-battlefield-data-to-partners-for-ai-model-training

That’s it for the Russian-Ukrainian update this week. I’ve got some Iran conflict items and some China-Taiwan items to post. Maybe later this week.

2. Various reports from Russian milbloggers say that civilian truck drivers are refusing to drive the M-14 and associated roads. And Independent truck operators don’t want to risk their trucks. While Ukraine has specifically been attacking high-value military vehicles and oil tankers, they have not until now been targeting civilian vehicles. A leaked order from the Russian army instructs military drivers to repaint their vehicles in non-military colors and apply civilian logos so they’ll look more like civilian trucks.

If anything, this will make it easier for Ukraine to strike military traffic, because civilian traffic is getting sparser, especially since photos taken along the M-14 show that most gas stations along the corridor are out of gas. Some still advertise diesel and natural gas, though. I’m not sure why the diesel supplies are less affected than gasoline supplies. Maybe because the ratio of automobiles to trucks is so much higher? Or maybe the diesel storage facilities in the occupied territories haven’t been hit yet?

(Full disclosure: this photo is of a gas station in Crimea.)

3. Some Russian units have repainted their trucks with black-and-white zebra-striped camouflage, reminiscent of WWI dazzle camouflage. This was done to confuse Hornet UAVs, which have AI-assisted final-track lock-on. Russian milbloggers doubt this will fool Ukrainian AI systems.

4. Crimea is rationing fuel to 20 liters per day per driver. But good luck finding any. The Russian-installed head of occupied Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov, announced that gasoline coupons would be introduced for AI-95 fuel, while sales of AI-92 would be limited to 20 liters per customer. Aksyonov said authorities expect the situation to stabilize within a month. “I call on Crimeans and visitors to the republic to remain calm and to rely only on official sources of information.” The Crimean Wind Telegram channel released a video showing a long queue of cars at a gas station, writing that “there is no point in queuing unless you’re one of the lucky few who’ve managed to get hold of vouchers issued by companies for their own use.” Russian officials are blaming unspecified temporary logistics problems for the fuel shortages.

The governor of Sevastopol announced that there is no more gasoline. "We are temporarily out of AI-92 and AI-95 fuel. We expect fuel deliveries later today. I will keep you informed." The rest of his translated Telegram post here…

5. A Russian lady posted a video taken while she was presumably driving out of Crimea. “Here’s the situation with petrol in Crimea,” she said. “You drive into Kerch, and towards the South Coast there’s still petrol, and at petrol stations like TES, Atan. If you drive towards Krasnoperekopsk, then starting Dzhankoy, there is absolutely no petrol of any kind. No 92, no 95, only diesel fuel. And even then, some petrol stations are completely out of everything. So keep this in mind when traveling to Crimea… Keep in mind you just drive across Crimea like this, and there’s no petrol. And you won’t have enough for the trip back. So, those of you with trips planned should probably reconsider, because there’s a possibility you’ll arrive by car and leave by foot — walking.” Krasnoperekopsk and Dzhankoy are in northern Crimea, so gasoline shortages seem uneven across the peninsula (?).

5. Some fuel seems to be getting in. Sources say authorities are reluctant to allow the Kerch Strait bridge to be used for fuel transport (for obvious explosive reasons), but they may be forced to. According to both Ukrainian sources and Russian milbloggers, the three biggest ferries (which could carry train cars full of fuel) have been disabled by Ukrainian drones and are no longer operating. The Russian milblogger with the handle “Fighterbomber” summarized the logistics situation. He writes that “there were three railway ferries, all of them were screwed. A new one is expected sometime around September. Moreover, there’s a shortage of sailors for these ferries. The queue for car ferries is up to 5 days.” He contradicts other sources that say no fuel at all is coming across the Kerch Strait bridge, saying, “the transport of fuel by rail is permitted across the bridge in exceptional cases following a terrorist attack.” Not sure what constitutes a terrorist attack, escpecially since terrorist attacks have become synonymous for Ukrainian drone strikes. But “the owners of railway barrels are not eager to provide them, because no one insures them.” Finally, he writes, “There’s simply no one willing to drive tankers through the new territories, because these are civilian drivers, and they don’t even pay a hundred rubles per trip. Or even two. On the peninsula itself, there are practically no private owners willing to store fuel since everything is attacked repeatedly.”

6. The Russian-appointed governor of Kherson, Vladimir Saldo, compared the current situation to the Siege of Leningrad. “This is cynical barbarism. Such actions, in their cruelty, resemble the fascist blockade of Leningrad, when the enemy tried to intimidate people, disrupt communication between territories, and break the will of the peaceful population.”

NB: Saldo is a ‘colorful’ character. He was the Mayor of Kherson (2002–2012) and a People’s Deputy of Ukraine (2012–2015). In 2022, Ukrainian prosecutors were preparing a case against him for commissioning a contract killing. But Russia made him head of the occupation administration when they invaded. See his Wikipedia bio for the details of the contract killing. The backstory is pretty wild.

A description of his criminal past here…
Prosecution by Ukraine

7. The Russian-appointed governor of the Zaporizhzhia region, Yevgeny Balitsky, announced that they’re unbanning Telegram. “Today, we are experiencing certain difficulties with the alert system. Unfortunately, the Max messenger functionality currently does not allow for consistent delivery of push notifications about threats to the public. According to technical specialists, this is due to the app’s architecture. Using alternative channels, such as SMS notifications, is also not possible during service outages. To ensure public safety, we have decided to temporarily return to Telegram messenger… We are implementing a comprehensive set of measures aimed at ending the whitelisting regime and lifting internet restrictions in our region. All necessary work is underway.” The ‘Two Majors’ Telegram channel says it’s because their mobile air defense teams can’t manage without it. Russian mobile air defense teams rely on the app for coordination. The April ban on Telegram crippled their communications.

8. Over on X, Clément Molin analyzed the geolocations of the over a thousand drone strikes that Ukraine has made against the occupied territories since the beginning of this year, and 35% hit depots and warehouses, 20% vehicles, 12% fuel and energy targets, 7% air defense systems, 5% military personnel and military bases, 3% radar and EW systems, 1% artillery, and 17% were targets he couldn’t identify.

9. Some Western analysts, and at least one Russian milblogger, think that Ukraine is ready to dust off its tanks and troop carriers and go on the offensive. A push through Kherson to completely cut off Crimea from its two land-bridge routes is the consensus strategy. I don’t buy it. While Russian logistics are screwed, the Russian army hasn’t collapsed yet, and their drone operators are still maintaining their kill zone (albeit their kill zone isn’t as extensive or complete as the Ukrainian kill zone). It would be a fiasco if Ukraine tried to advance right now. I expect they’ll continue laying drone siege to the occupied territories, and let the lack of supplies and fuel starve them out. Unless, of course, Russia comes up with a good counter strategy. And right now, that doesn’t seem to be in the offing.

10. For those of you who still think (or hope) Russia will win this conflict, the Multipolaritypod Substack summarized the results run by some Australian military analysts. They the used the standard Lancaster model of troop recruitment, heavy armaments manufacturing, and troop and armament casualties to predict which side will win. Their claim is that Russia will win in the next six months to a year. But their model doesn’t seem to reflect the current reality of drone warfare. As of the beginning of May, per Colonel Robert “Magyar” Brovdi, Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces claims their drone operators have inflicted between 33,000-35,000 casualties (!). And because each drone is equipped with a camera, they’re pretty sure of this number.

So, If there were ~10,000 effective combat drone operators producing ~35,000 Russian casualties/month, that would imply that about 3–4 Russian casualties per operator per month or between 15–20 casualties per operator since January 2026.

The Russians have been unable to mount an equivalent drone operation against the Ukrainians. Russian milbloggers are daily lamenting that institutional sclerosis has hampered both Russian drone production and development. It seems like the tipping point is coming sooner than the model predicts, and will favor the Ukrainians and not the Russians. We’ll see.

The Multipolarity Substack

Formula developed by long-dead British polymath shows one side nearing defeat in Ukraine

The Ukraine War has now passed its 50th month — over four years in old money. Who’s winning? Both the mainstream and alternative media obsess over this question. Whether in genteel opinion columns, febrile social media arguments, or the intellectual foreign policy press, endless words are written to explain to us that one side or the other is leading th…

Read more

3 months ago · 489 likes · 306 comments · Multipolarity

11. Tochnyi.info has a good summary of the evolution of Ukraine’s logistic interdiction strategy.

https://tochnyi.info/2026/05/logistics-lockdown-disrupting-the-road-logistics-network-of-russia-in-the-occupied-territories-of-ukraine/

12. France has abandoned its go-it-alone nuclear strategy. President Macron has announced a “forward deterrence” plan, where French Rafale jets carrying tactical nukes will rotate secretly through allied bases across Europe. Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Sweden, Denmark, and the Czech Republic have agreed to host French Rafales armed with tactical nukes. Italy and Spain have ruled it out. Each Rafale carries an ASMP-A missile with a 300-kiloton warhead and a 550 km range. France has also ordered 61 new Rafales for €6B, aiming for total 286.

Macron he signed the Northwood Declaration with the UK in July of 2025 to coordinate nuclear capabilities. France’s four ballistic-missile subs will coordinate their at-sea rotations with the Royal Navy’s four UK Trident subs to maintain a continuous deterrent. Macron said at the Île Longue submarine base: “To be free, we must be feared, and to be feared, we must be powerful.” He said France will increase its arsenal and stop revealing warhead counts and the locations of its nuclear-capable jets and submarines. France has 290 warheads and the UK has 225. France says, going forward, it will no longer publish its warhead inventories.

https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/france-transforming-nuclear-forces-role-europe-forward-deterrence

13. Ukraine and Sweden signed an agreement whereby Sweden will supply Ukraine with 20 Gripen E/F fighters using EU-backed funding. Sweden also will also donate 16 Gripen C/D aircraft as direct military assistance. Zelenskyy said the Gripens will be key to combatting Russian glide bombs. “Russian aviation bombs remain one of our main challenges. We are talking about thousands, not hundreds, of bombs dropped per month. Their aircraft launch guided glide bombs from both Russian territory and temporarily occupied parts of Ukraine at distances over 100 kilometers. We have never had enough air defense systems to intercept these bombs. With them, the Russians are destroying our border settlements in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv, Sumy, and other regions. Many towns and villages have been completely razed by aerial bombs.”

I asked Gemini why they couldn’t use F-16s for this purpose, but Gemini said that “the Swedish Saab Gripen is considered highly advantageous for countering Russian glide bombs—primarily deployed by Su-34s 60–100 km behind front lines—thanks to two distinct advantages: missile capability and austere operational design.” According to the Saab website, each Gripen can carry up to seven Meteor BVR (beyond-visual-range) air-to-air missiles each with a range of 200 km. This allows a Gripen to fire at Russian Su-34s from a safe distance, forcing the bombers to abort their glide bomb releases without exposing the Gripen to close-range Russian air defenses. The Meteor is superior to F-16’s AIM-120 missiles.

And “unlike the F-16, which requires long, smooth, heavily guarded runways and extensive ground support equipment, the Gripen was specifically engineered for landing and taking off from austere, rough airstrips or 800-meter sections of public highways… The Gripen was designed for a minimal logistics footprint. It can be refueled and rearmed in as little as 10 minutes by a tiny ground crew, often consisting of just one or two technicians and a few conscripts.” This means that Ukraine could keep more Gripens airborne at any given time.

https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/france-transforming-nuclear-forces-role-europe-forward-deterrence

14. Vladimir Solovyov’s response on his Sunday Evening with Vladimir Solovyov TV show was: “We will annihilate England with nuclear weapons. Destroy Paris. Occupy Berlin. Bring Warsaw back into Putin’s USSR 2.0.”

15. Lt. Gen. Christopher J. Niemi, a Deputy Chief of Staff, and the USAF Chief Modernization Officer, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee: “We heard today that the Ukrainians are building a million drones a month. We think of large quantities as in terms of dozens; and they’re obviously at the other end of the spectrum.” Paraphrasing: The AF is adopting that lesson through low-cost cruise missiles and affordable mass munitions. For years, we had no peer adversary and no real threat of aircraft being destroyed on the ground. That is no longer the case. We need high-end systems like the F-47 and B-21, but also cheaper platforms that can be bought in larger numbers and produced at much higher rates.” At least someone in the Pentagon seems to be taking the advances in drone warfare seriously.