Ukraine Invasion: Part 40

[MagicFox]

40 threads, still here 🇺🇦

I’ve been out all day. Is this our dear old Liebig under a new name?

Moscow did not even exist yet when Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv was already standing. Over a thousand years, it experienced everything—enemy raids, wars, occupation, revolutions.

And to think it has been under Russian Orthodox patriarchate until very recently. I could not believe this when I found out (back in 2016).

Oh is that what the deletions are?

Missed them

That's A logical conclusion.

https://twitter.com/mhmck/status/1665400759322570753 Freedom of Russia Legion and Russian Volunteer Corp street fighting against the "terrorist" Russian armed forces

@minsmum more reports from WSJ on the incursion into Russia’s Belgorod region and fighting in the border village of Novaya Tavolzhank.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/russian-strike-kills-ukrainian-child-wounds-several-more-9b86289b

Ukraine-Backed Troops Capture Russian Soldiers in Cross-Border Foray
Cross-border raids are testing Russia’s defenses away from the front line inside Ukraine

KYIV, Ukraine—A fresh incursion into Russia’s Belgorod region by Ukraine-backed troops on Sunday, who said they seized territory and captured two Russian soldiers, added to signs of vulnerability in Russia’s defenses on its own territory ahead of a major expected offensive by Ukraine aimed at taking back land occupied by Moscow.
...
Two groups composed mainly of Russian nationalists, opposed to the Kremlin and backed by Kyiv, are posing a growing threat to Russian border regions and pressuring Moscow to draw troops away from front-line areas inside Ukraine, where Russian forces are bracing for attempts by Ukraine to break through their heavily fortified positions.
...

Deploying more troops to shore up Russia’s border regions could weaken its defenses in parts of its 600-mile front line in eastern and southern Ukraine, where Moscow in recent months has built fortifications including trenches, minefields and antitank ditches. Kyiv has said it is ready to launch its offensive against Russia’s occupation forces, but has kept secret where it will try to strike a blow.

Oh my God.

This has been filmed and uploaded, it looks like it's true.

Dmitri
AT wartranslated

PMC Wagner detained and interrogated no other but the commander of the 72nd Brigade, Roman Venevitin. Wagner and the 72nd Brigade shared positions in Bakhmut. They detained the man, beat him, broke his nose, and forced to record a video admitting to firing at a car of PMC Wagner due to "personal animosity" towards them. They accuse him of being drunk while doing so, speaking to him as if he is a subordinate. This is a complete demoralisation of the Russian Armed Forces.

Wagner is more and more out of Russian control.

@ReleaseTheDucksOfWar I wonder if he was drunk or if there is something else going on. What on earth is the Russian high command going to do, they have to do something surely

Countermeasure coverage

As the news reports today there seems to have been a counteroffensive by Ukraine on Russian positions. As I Ukraine has asked for media shown e how will this be reported?.Do you allow Russia to gain an advantage in the media sphere? Does.western media have an obligation now to be vague about their reporting to a large extent?

Ouf. Good question.

I guess if it comes up in the ISW or Kyiv Post then it's fine - official bodies, Geraschenko. Beyond that I dunno. It's already all over social media .. any ideas?

Hi all, without wishing to derail discussion of this development, some posters have contacted me to ask if we could have some rules/housekeeping for the thread. If you agree feel free to pm me with your thoughts and I'll compile suggestions and post for consensus ahead of the next thread. I suggest pm-img me rather than responding here to keep the thread Ukraine focused. As you were!

Russia are claiming they've thwarted a major assault, this hasn't been verified but was from the BBC.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-65806152

(My gut instinct is that it's bollocks, or a small assault).

I've lost track a little bit here...

Am I right in thinking that the Ukrainian Offensive still hasn't started as far as we know? There seems to be some rumblings to Twitter, but nothing very clear.

Is the fighting in Belgorod a distraction? To say to the Russians, don't be so certain that we can't come & attack you and also a bit of a 'look over here' whilst something else is going on over there?

A very basic update of a beyond, uber complicated x100000 situation would be very much appreciated!

Upbeat interview with General David Patreaus, reported on CNN this morning, but no longer available. Original interview with Radio 4. Lots of ifs and buts of course. Radio 4 Interview

I guess we won't know anything reliable for at least several days. I'm trying to be stoical but feeling emotional and anxious

Heroyam Slava

Its a bit unclear if things have started yet, reports from the Russian side suggest that there may have been a push that's been repelled, with 100s of Ukrainian deaths, but frankly I don't believe them. I think if it hasn't kicked off yet it's pretty imminent.

Re Belgorod, seems to be a consensus that it was Russians but that its likely to have been sanctioned by Kyiv. If nothing else it makes it difficult for the Russians to decide where to concentrate their forces and domestically makes it difficult to justify pushing in Ukraine and concentrating there when there is a need for protection at home.

There seems to be some rumblings to Twitter, but nothing very clear.

There will be much kept under wraps. It is essential. Much of what has already happened - the explosions on the Kerch Bridge for example - we have been told all will be revealed when the time is right. Perhaps after the war. We don't want this to be a repeat of 1993 when TV crews were lined up on the beaches of Somalia as US tank crews rolled up with an incredulous fury.

Thanks so much as always for your thoughtful and knowledgeable explanations everybody.

Yes definitely agree that it's very unlikely, and indeed inappropriate, for there to be a rolling news-style coverage of the offensive. I just hope it all goes as well as it possibly can.

Sorry bit of an aside but a very interesting discussion on Chatham House about the positioning of Russian nuclear weapons in Belarus. General consensus is that the only purpose is to frighten the West into thinking that use of such weapons is getting more likely. In reality its all theatre, the weapons are no closer to Western soil than if they were in Kaliningrad. The real risk of this is that it leads to a reduction in Western support (which I think at this stage is unlikely given the West has been confident in calling Putin's bluff till now) not that they will actually be used.

I just know that the nuclear question frightens people so always helpful to tackle head on.

Something I have been wondering about for a while - but how stable is Belarus really? Is there any hope of another popular uprising there?

I remember vividly the 2020-2021 protests, and the courage people showed then. Those were put down with the help of the Russian army, but surely the Russian army no longer has the resources to spend on such activities.

My sense is also that there has been a lot of quite effective sabotage that has gone on in Belarus.

These new Freedom of Russia and similar groups seem to have appeared out of nowhere (although I am sure that is not true), as up until now one didn't get a sense of a lot of really serious Russian opposition - but that same couldn't be said for Belarus. So I keep wondering why we don't hear more about the opposition? How did they so effectively manage to stamp it out?

Anybody heard anything?

Of course we're not going to get anything definitive for weeks/months and rightly so....

Look back almost exactly 79 years today at D-Day and the following Normandy campaign. The detail of what went on wasn't a great analogue for what we might see now in terms of tactics but it's a good example of how misinformation/confusion, much of it deliberately sown, can be useful.

The classic being prior to D-Day where was Patton? His location was deliberately obscured but efforts were made to hint he was in the SE UK - if he was really in around Kent/SE UK did that mean the real invasion was going to be in Pas de Calais and that the Normandy landings were just a diversion? That bought the allies some very useful time...

Then in the weeks months afterward D-Day there were multiple attacks at the eastern end of the Normandy front (Montgomery's end)....The public and the Germans were kept guessing as to whether they were genuine attempts at breakouts or whether they were being done in an attempt to pin German forces in place whilst the American's (Patton now really was in theatre) prepared to swing down and then around from the western end of the line.......answers on a post card...

I suppose the point of the above ramble is that personally I'm happy to hear all the reports that the Russians are getting kicked in various places, I'm darned if I know what the big picture is and don't expect to know for some time.

Kyiv Independent reporting that the Belgians are investigating reports of Belgian weapons being used within Russia. This is following reports that the incursion into Belgorod was done using rifles of Belgian and Czech origin.

To be honest I do worry that such reports will spook some of the more nervous in the West and increase any reluctance to send weaponry.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-june-4-2023

Key Takeaways

• Elements of the all-Russian pro-Ukrainian Russian Volunteer Corps (RDK) and Freedom of Russia Legion (LSR) conducted another limited raid into Belgorod Oblast on June 4 and are reportedly continuing to operate in a Russian border settlement.
• Belgorod Oblast Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov responded to a RDK and LSR demand to negotiate for the exchange of captured Russian prisoners of war (POWs).
• The dissonant Russian responses to and reporting about the limited raid in Belgorod Oblast continue to suggest that the Russian leadership has not yet decided how to react to these limited cross-border raids.
• The limited raids and border shelling in Belgorod Oblast are increasingly becoming the current focal point for criticism against the Russian military leadership.
• Russian forces again targeted Ukraine with Iranian-made drones and cruise missiles on June 4 making it the fourth consecutive day of strikes across Ukraine.
• Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin claimed on June 4 that Ukrainian forces may have regained positions in southwestern Bakhmut, supporting repeated Ukrainian reports that Ukrainian forces maintain positions on the southwestern outskirts of the city.
• Ukrainian and Russian forces both claimed to have made limited territorial gains on the Kupyansk-Svatove line.
• Russian forces conducted limited ground attacks around Bakhmut and Marinka.
• Ukrainian forces conducted local ground attacks and reportedly made limited tactical gains in western Donetsk Oblast and eastern Zaporizhia Oblast.
• The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) submitted a draft government decree that will no longer require an individual’s presence at an enlistment office for military registration.
• Russian officials continue to use rest and rehabilitation schemes to deport Ukrainian children from occupied territories to Russia.

Kyiv Independent Telegram

⚡️Sky News: Alleged arms contract shows $1 million arms deal (https://kyivindependent.com/sky-news-alleged-iran-russia-arms-contract/) between Russia, Iran.
Excerpts from an alleged arms contract obtained by Sky News through an unnamed informed source claim that Iran supplied Russia with $1 million worth of artillery, tank shells, and rockets. Sky News said it could not independently verify the information.

⚡️ Anti-Kremlin militia (https://kyivindependent.com/pro-ukraine-group-in-russia-sa/) plans to give Russian prisoners to Kyiv.
The anti-Kremlin militia said it plans to give Russian soldiers allegedly captured during a cross-border raid to the Ukrainian authorities in a video published on Telegram on June 4.

⚡️ Russian governor reports fire (https://kyivindependent.com/fire-reported-at-belgorod-energy-facility/) at Belgorod energy facility on June 5.
According to Gladkov's preliminary infromation, an "explosive device dropped from a drone" caused the fire. This allegation has not been independently verified.

⚡️CNN: Network of sabotage agents backed by Ukraine likely responsible for drone attacks (https://kyivindependent.com/cnn-network-of-pro-ukrainian-sabotage-agents-for-drone-strikes/) in Russia.
Ukraine has likely established a network of pro-Ukrainian sabotage agents within Russian territory to carry out strategic drone attacks, CNN reported on June 5.

⚡️SBU: 3 members of Russian spy network apprehended (https://kyivindependent.com/sbu-apprehends-russian-spy-network-members/) in Dnipropetrovsk, Vinnytsia, Odesa oblasts.

Clinic guard arrested over locked bomb shelter that led to civilian deaths in Kyiv (https://kyivindependent.com/clinic-guard-arrested-over-closed-bomb-shelter-that-led-to-civilian-death-in-kyiv/)
Meanwhile, a special commission checked over 1,000 of Kyiv's 4,000 facilities that qualify as bomb shelters.
It concluded that 44% of them were either locked or unsuitable for use.

⚡️Zelensky: Russia manages (https://kyivindependent.com/zelensky-russia-manages-to-bypass-international-sanctions-uses-other-countries-to-continue-terror/) to bypass sanctions, uses other countries to ‘continue terror’.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said on June 4 during his video address that Russia manages to bypass international sanctions and benefit from Western technology by using a network of intermediaries.

⚡️Official: Up to 20 Ukrainian men arrested (https://kyivindependent.com/official-border-guards-detain-up-to-20-ukrainian-men-a-day-for-illegal-crossing/) every day for illegally crossing border.
Andriy Demchenko, a spokesman for Ukraine's State Border Guard, reported on June 4 that border guards detain up to 20 men trying to go abroad illegally every day.

“Since the full-scale invasion, the situation has worsened. War has become a convenient excuse for corrupt officials,” says Kyiv Independent reporter, Oleg Sukhov.
In this episode (* we are unmasking Ukraine’s judicial corruption, and Oleg explains where and why the fight against corruption falls short.

⚡️Media: Latvia transfers 66 vehicles (https://kyivindependent.com/latvia-gives-66-vehicles-confiscated-from-drunk-drivers-to-ukraine/) confiscated from drunk drivers to Ukraine.

⚡️ Media: Russia to reduce oil output (https://kyivindependent.com/opec-6/) in 2024.
Russia will reduce its oil output by 650,000 barrels per day in 2024, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported following an OPEC+ meeting in Vienna on June 4.
After the cut in 2024, the Russian oil output estimate will become approximately 9.3 million barrels per day.

Ukrainian State-Owned Enterprises Weekly – Issue 90 (https://kyivindependent.com/ukrainian-state-owned-enterprises-weekly-issue-90/)
On May 31, Naftogaz reported that it had reached agreements with investors on ways to restructure Eurobonds maturing in July 2022 and November 2026; Ukrzaliznytsia to receive a $25 million grant from the World Bank, the company reported on May 26. To get this grant, Ukrzaliznytsia will start cooperating with the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS).

UNITED24 Media Telegram

✈️ Ukraine will not use F-16 fighters during the summer counteroffensive
Defense Minister Reznikov stated this in an interview with the Japanese publication NHK.
According to him, our country will be ready to deploy F-16 in autumn or winter. Pilot training will take time.
Also, Kyiv will still negotiate with partners on providing engineering and technical personnel for the maintenance and repair of these aircraft.

Ukrainian pilots will be sent to train on American F-16 fighter jets in groups, as it is impossible to send them all at once, — the spokesman of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Yuriy Ignat, on the telethon.
According to him, if part of the pilots will study abroad, then part will fight in Ukraine. Therefore, training will take place on a rotational basis.

China has promised to expand military communications with Ukraine and help end the war — Bloomberg, citing Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Volodymyr Gavrylov.

The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation proposes to allow the registration of Russians for military registration without their personal appearance at the military commissariat — based on data from state information resources, — a draft of changes published on the portal of regulatory and legal acts.
In the Russian Federation, it is expected that the electronic register of conscripts will be operational before the autumn conscription.

❗️Sweden has fulfilled the demands of Türkiye and has the right to join NATO, — Jens Stoltenberg, following the meeting with the Turkish leader Recep Erdogan in Istanbul. [but does Érdogan feel the same? I hope so]

The legendary band Guns N' Roses started a concert in the UAE showing the support for Ukraine

🇺🇦💪Ukrainian tennis player Elina Svitolina beat the Russian for the second time in a row and made it to the Roland Garros quarterfinals.

Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas emphasized that Estonia's accession to NATO was a free choice of the country, and Russia's claim that NATO expansion threatens its security is a myth.

New caricature of Putin from The Washington Post
It shows the Russian dictator lying on the ground, chained to tractors with Ukrainian flags. The horse tied with ropes near the bunker probably symbolizes his "second army of the world".
Cartoonist: Michael de Adder