What's going on in Ukraine?

[tabascoboy]

And again more or less unconditional surrender demanded

Russian media have published a "peace" memorandum allegedly presented to Ukraine, outlining the following demands:

• Full withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia within 30 days of a ceasefire
• International recognition of Crimea, Donbas, and "Novorossiya" as part of Russia
• Ukraine’s neutrality
• Elections in Ukraine followed by a peace treaty
• Ban on redeployment of Ukrainian troops except for withdrawal
• Prohibition of nuclear weapons on Ukrainian territory
• Ban on Western arms and intelligence support

[Hellraiser]

Another Tu-95 confirmed destroyed via satellite imagery at Ukrainka airbase in the Amur region. This was a fifth airbase that was attacked but was not mentioned in SBU dispatches as it was smaller scale and initially it wasn't thought to have been successful.

[Flockwitt]

The commander of the Ukranian ground forces has resigned after an Iskaner hit a troop training ground with significant casualties.

[fishfoodie]

Next step has to be slipping a few Trojan drone carriers onto the Orc railway network as boxcars, or fuel tankers etc; even the rumor of it would drive them mad trying to go thru millions of cars looking for something that might or might not exist, & the resultant traffic chaos would be more disruptive than dropping a hundred bridges !

It'll be interesting to hear from the RAF & other NATO Air forces if there's a noticeable drop off in the usual Bear harassment flights around the NATO perimeter, as they've been a feature for decades, & now there's a lot less flight worthy Tu-95's, & one of the bases targeted was up at Kola, there might be significantly less.

[tabascoboy]

The Security Service of Ukraine has struck the Crimean Bridge for the third time — this time underwater.

The operation lasted several months. SBU agents planted explosives on the bridge's supports, and on June 3, the first explosive device was detonated without any civilian casualties.

The underwater bases of the supports were damaged at the seabed level — aided by 1,100 kg of explosives. As a result, the bridge is now in a critical condition. SBU Chief Vasyl Maliuk personally oversaw and coordinated the planning of the operation.

[tabascoboy]

Little doubt that they will walk away without doing anything meaningful to help

The Trump administration and Ukraine consider parts of Russia’s ceasefire demands, voiced in Istanbul, unacceptable — ABC News.

U.S. officials say Moscow is undermining meaningful negotiations. Trump is reportedly frustrated with the talks and increasingly shifting focus from Ukraine to the Pacific region.

[Uncle fester]

How much damage has been done to the bridge? Appears to be still standing?

[Hellraiser]

How much damage has been done to the bridge? Appears to be still standing?

It's doesn't have to collapse for the damage to be borderline irreparable. Structural damage to the piers compromises the entire structural integrity of that part of the bridge. It's not a relatively straightforward, if time consuming, "swap out, swap in" job like the spans that had to be replaced in the previous two attacks.

[Flockwitt]

Looks like deliberate sabotage in Serbia by Russia. An announcenment to denounce their weapon sales to Ukraine then an explosion in a Serbian munitions factory with multiple wounded.

[Uncle fester]

How much damage has been done to the bridge? Appears to be still standing?

It's doesn't have to collapse for the damage to be borderline irreparable. Structural damage to the piers compromises the entire structural integrity of that part of the bridge. It's not a relatively straightforward, if time consuming, "swap out, swap in" job like the spans that had to be replaced in the previous two attacks.

We're talking about Russians here though. As long as there is tarmac between the spans, they will continue to cross it.

[Uncle fester]

Reported but unverified.

[fishfoodie]

Bit hard to know what any Air Force type was supposed to do that would have stopped this attack ?

Should they have been out checking the back of trucks ?

The failure lies in those that never built hangers for critical strategic aircraft, & just parks them out in the Siberian winter with tyres on their wings, & expects that to protect them; or maybe the vaunted FSB, who should have done a better job, but I suppose that's a bit too close to Putin himself taking the blame.

[laurent]

Bit hard to know what any Air Force type was supposed to do that would have stopped this attack ?

Should they have been out checking the back of trucks ?

The failure lies in those that never built hangers for critical strategic aircraft, & just parks them out in the Siberian winter with tyres on their wings, & expects that to protect them; or maybe the vaunted FSB, who should have done a better job, but I suppose that's a bit too close to Putin himself taking the blame.

In french it's called "Blaming the lampeholder" (Accuser le lampiste).

a commander is higher than the lampiste though

[Uncle fester]

Bit hard to know what any Air Force type was supposed to do that would have stopped this attack ?

Should they have been out checking the back of trucks ?

The failure lies in those that never built hangers for critical strategic aircraft, & just parks them out in the Siberian winter with tyres on their wings, & expects that to protect them; or maybe the vaunted FSB, who should have done a better job, but I suppose that's a bit too close to Putin himself taking the blame.

In french it's called "Blaming the lampeholder" (Accuser le lampiste).

a commander is higher than the lampiste though

In Western corporate culture, it's usually the cleaner who gets the bullet so it's quaintly reassuring to see the Russians demand accountability in their upper echelons.

[Enzedder]

Loved this cartoon

Trojan.jpg (189.96 KiB) Viewed 864 times

[Hellraiser]

DECREE OF THE PRESIDENT OF UKRAINE No. 386/2025

On the appointment of R. Brovdi as Commander of the Unmanned Systems Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

To appoint Robert Yosypovych Brovdi as Commander of the Unmanned Systems Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

President of Ukraine V. ZELENSKYI
June 3, 2025

https://www.president.gov.ua/documents/3862025-55265

[mat the expat]

Next step has to be slipping a few Trojan drone carriers onto the Orc railway network as boxcars, or fuel tankers etc; even the rumor of it would drive them mad trying to go thru millions of cars looking for something that might or might not exist, & the resultant traffic chaos would be more disruptive than dropping a hundred bridges !

It'll be interesting to hear from the RAF & other NATO Air forces if there's a noticeable drop off in the usual Bear harassment flights around the NATO perimeter, as they've been a feature for decades, & now there's a lot less flight worthy Tu-95's, & one of the bases targeted was up at Kola, there might be significantly less.

If I recall rightly, those are Maritime/Anti-Sub patrol planes and whilst they can carry some similar munitions, aren't fully compatible

[tabascoboy]

Assessment of the latest attack on the Kerch Bridge. With impact underwater it's difficult to assess how much or how little structural damage has been caused before a long and thorough inspection of the foundations. Following all the protective measures taken by Russia to protect the bridge, if nothing else it's a psychological low to their self-esteem anyway



Full topic with images at https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1929 ... 99202.html

[Hellraiser]

[Hellraiser]

Visually confirmed aircraft losses now stand at:

8 Tu-95Ms
12 Tu-22M3s
2 A50s
1 An-12
1 Il-78

[laurent]

Visually confirmed aircraft losses now stand at:

8 Tu-95Ms
12 Tu-22M3s
2 A50s
1 An-12
1 Il-78

Keep countin'

[fishfoodie]

Visually confirmed aircraft losses now stand at:

8 Tu-95Ms
12 Tu-22M3s
2 A50s
1 An-12
1 Il-78

Keep countin'

New video released



The Bears do burn magnificently, & when they do, the wings drop off immediately when the drone goes off in the spot they've identified as the target.

[Enzedder]

Very well done - and they (rightly) kept it secret from the US to avoid compromise

Yep, well played by Ukraine. And they were far too smart to alert the Russian asset in the WH.

Now hopefully they can sink that bastard bridge.

They will be destroyed now and won't exist in 5 years. As they didn't as an independent country, before 1991

And I wouldn't be too excited about the damage done. In war time truth goes out the window. So it may be accurate or maybe not.

Where have you gone mate? Little old Ukraine gave your heroes a huge kick in the nuts and then whacked the bridge again.

You're backing a loser.

[Slick]

Putins going to send in a nuke

[fishfoodie]

Putins going to send in a nuke

Well if he's dumb/desperate enough to do that, then very swiftly the Ukrainians will turn nuclear power plants around St Petersburg & Moscow into the worlds largest dirty bombs.

This latest attack should have alarm bells ringing in the Kremlin as to just how exposed they are, & they have no idea how many of these trojan horses are parked up near power plants, or docks, or refineries, or chemical plants etc, just waiting to turn them into toxic, smoking ruins !

[Sandstorm]

Time to remove Putin and for Russia to save their economy.

[Hellraiser]

Putins going to send in a nuke

He doesn't have the balls. He went AWOL for three days after the attack, just like Beslan, just like Moskva, just like Prigozhin's failed putsch.

[Hellraiser]

Time to remove Putin and for Russia to save their economy.

Too far gone. They're fucked either way.

[Biffer]

I spent some time wondering if Firewater is a genuine Russian propagandist or if he’s just a contrary trolling prick.

Then I realised he’s a cunt either way so it doesn’t really matter.

[Hellraiser]

I spent some time wondering if Firewater is a genuine Russian propagandist or if he’s just a contrary trolling prick.

Then I realised he’s a cunt either way so it doesn’t really matter.

It's DAC.

[Hellraiser]

The Russians are currently losing 167 KIA for every 1 sq km they are taking in Ukraine.

Russia needs to take another 21,600 sq km to completely occupy the four oblasts it "annexed".

[Uncle fester]

The Russians are currently losing 167 KIA for every 1 sq km they are taking in Ukraine.

Russia needs to take another 21,600 sq km to completely occupy the four oblasts it "annexed".

Just the 3.5 odd million needed so.

[Guy Smiley]

I spent some time wondering if Firewater is a genuine Russian propagandist or if he’s just a contrary trolling prick.

Then I realised he’s a cunt either way so it doesn’t really matter.

It's DAC.

It's not, we went through this on the POTUS thread. It's a Kiwi poster which makes the Putin / Trump love even sadder. DAC wouldn't post on Kiwi Super rugby threads. I don't really give a shit but seeing so many of you confidently assert the DAC stuff only feeds the little fella's needy ego.

[Enzedder]

I spent some time wondering if Firewater is a genuine Russian propagandist or if he’s just a contrary trolling prick.

Then I realised he’s a cunt either way so it doesn’t really matter.

He posts via VPN servers so no way of knowing.

However, my give-a-fuck meter barely registers with him anyway. He is so wrong on everything he posts, I use it for entertainment value.

[Guy Smiley]

A challenge for the video watchers, a written article discussing the nature of Ukraine's tactical approach to waging this war...

https://theconversation.com/the-secret- ... 1749074582

The iconoclastic American general Douglas Macarthur once said that “wars are never won in the past”.

That sentiment certainly seemed to ring true following Ukraine’s recent audacious attack on Russia’s strategic bomber fleet, using small, cheap drones housed in wooden pods and transported near Russian airfields in trucks.

The synchronised operation targeted Russian Air Force planes as far away as Irkutsk – more than 5,000 kilometres from Ukraine. Early reports suggest around a third of Russia’s long-range bombers were either destroyed or badly damaged. Russian military bloggers have put the estimated losses lower, but agree the attack was catastrophic for the Russian Air Force, which has struggled to adapt to Ukrainian tactics.

This particular attack was reportedly 18 months in the making. To keep it secret was an extraordinary feat. Notably, Kyiv did not inform the United States that the attack was in the offing. The Ukrainians judged – perhaps understandably – that sharing intelligence on their plans could have alerted the Kremlin in relatively short order.

Ukraine’s success once again demonstrates that its armed forces and intelligence services are the modern masters of battlefield innovation and operational security.

Finding new solutions

Western military planners have been carefully studying Ukraine’s successes ever since its forces managed to blunt Russia’s initial onslaught deep into its territory in early 2022, and then launched a stunning counteroffensive that drove the Russian invaders back towards their original starting positions.

There have been other lessons, too, about how the apparently weak can stand up to the strong. These include:

attacks on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s vanity project, the Kerch Bridge, linking the Russian mainland to occupied Crimea (the last assault occurred just days ago)

the relentless targeting of Russia’s oil and gas infrastructure with drones

attacks against targets in Moscow to remind the Russian populace about the war, and

its incursion into the Kursk region, which saw Ukrainian forces capture around 1,000 square kilometres of Russian territory.

The Ukrainian Security Service said on June 3 it had conducted a special operation and struck the Crimea-Russia bridge underwater. Ukrainian Security Service/EPA

On each occasion, Western defence analysts have questioned the wisdom of Kyiv’s moves.

Why invade Russia using your best troops when Moscow’s forces continue laying waste to cities in Ukraine?

Why hit Russia’s energy infrastructure if it doesn’t markedly impede the battlefield mobility of Russian forces?

And why attack symbolic targets like bridges when it could provoke Putin into dangerous “escalation”?

The answer to this is the key to effective innovation during wartime. Ukraine’s defence and security planners have interpreted their missions – and their best possible outcomes – far more accurately than conventional wisdom would have thought.

Above all, they have focused on winning the war they are in, rather than those of the past. This means:

using technological advancements to force the Russians to change their tactics

shaping the information environment to promote their narratives and keep vital Western aid flowing, and

deploying surprise attacks not just as ways to boost public morale, but also to impose disproportionate costs on the Russian state.

The impact of Ukraine’s drone attack

In doing so, Ukraine has had an eye for strategic effects. As the smaller nation reliant on international support, this has been the only logical choice.

Putin has been prepared to commit a virtually inexhaustible supply of expendable cannon fodder to continue his country’s war ad infinitum. Russia has typically won its wars this way – by attrition – albeit at a tremendous human and material cost.

That said, Ukraine’s most recent surprise attack does not change the overall contours of the war. The only person with the ability to end it is Putin himself.

That’s why Ukraine is putting as much pressure as possible on his regime, as well as domestic and international perceptions of it. It is key to Ukraine’s theory of victory.

This is also why the latest drone attack is so significant. Russia needs its long-range bomber fleet, not just to fire conventional cruise missiles at Ukrainian civilian and infrastructure targets, but as aerial delivery systems for its strategic nuclear arsenal.

The destruction of even a small portion of Russia’s deterrence capability has the potential to affect its nuclear strategy. It has increasingly relied on this strategy to threaten the West.

A second impact of the attack is psychological. The drone attacks are more likely to enrage Putin than bring him to the bargaining table. However, they reinforce to the Russian military that there are few places – even on its own soil – that its air force can act with operational impunity.

The surprise attacks also provide a shot in the arm domestically, reminding Ukrainians they remain very much in the fight.

Finally, the drone attacks send a signal to Western leaders. US President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance, for instance, have gone to great lengths to tell the world that Ukraine is weak and has “no cards”. This action shows Kyiv does indeed have some powerful cards to play.

That may, of course, backfire: after all, Trump is acutely sensitive to being made to look a fool. He may look unkindly at resuming military aid to Ukraine after being shown up for saying Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would be forced to capitulate without US support.

But Trump’s own hubris has already done that for him. His regular claims that a peace deal is just weeks away have gone beyond wishful thinking and are now monotonous.

Unsurprisingly, Trump’s reluctance to put anything approaching serious pressure on Putin has merely incentivised the Russian leader to string the process along.

Indeed, Putin’s insistence on a maximalist victory, requiring Ukrainian demobilisation and disarmament without any security guarantees for Kyiv, is not diplomacy at all. It is merely the reiteration of the same unworkable demands he has made since even before Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

However, Ukraine’s ability to smuggle drones undetected onto an opponent’s territory, and then unleash them all together, will pose headaches for Ukraine’s friends, as well as its enemies.

That’s because it makes domestic intelligence and policing part of any effective defence posture. It is a contingency democracies will have to plan for, just as much as authoritarian regimes, who are also learning from Ukraine’s lessons.

In other words, while the attack has shown up Russia’s domestic security services for failing to uncover the plan, Western security elites, as well as authoritarian ones, will now be wondering whether their own security apparatuses would be up to the job.

The drone strikes will also likely lead to questions about how useful it is to invest in high-end and extraordinarily expensive weapons systems when they can be vulnerable. The Security Service of Ukraine estimates the damage cost Russia US$7 billion (A$10.9 billion). Ukraine’s drones, by comparison, cost a couple of thousand dollars each.

At the very least, coming up with a suitable response to those challenges will require significant thought and effort. But as Ukraine has repeatedly shown us, you can’t win wars in the past.

[Flockwitt]

Yep, AI is taking the whole autonomous vehicle to another level extraordinarily quickly. It's a brave new world out there, and what a lot of people don't realise is that China is uniquely poised to be at the forefront of it. Nobody can come close to competing with China's manufacturing clout in this aspect.

A few other lessons off the top of my head:
Big bangs matter, glide bombs and their equivalents. In an increasingly urban world you need the massive bombs to be effective in urban environments.
HIMARS type rocket artillery matters.
Electronic warfare really matters.
Combined arms matters and how much of this is switched over to AI is really scary.

[tabascoboy]

In addition to blaming "London" for the airfield attacks ( which they seem to have abandoned the pretence that it didn't happen ):

[Uncle fester]

Those little black spots in picture 3.
Damage or the infamous tyres?

[laurent]

Those little black spots in picture 3.
Damage or the infamous tyres?

Tyres.

[fishfoodie]

Seems like now others have had a chance to review the newer video footage, Ukraine's claims of ~40 destroyed aircraft makes sense, as when studied in detail, there are several that sustained serious & possibly fatal damage, but this doesn't show up in the satellite views, but does in a frame by frame analysis of the actual attack footage.