Aug 21: E-Stories
Day 543 Chernihiv Kupyansk Sweden Netherlands Zelensky CounterOffensive UAdronesMoscow Kursk Mariupol EU China PolandSpies Giuliani SovietSmybols A&P RoyalOperaHouse KyivIndie UKDef Kapparov Noel
Catching up…
EA Worldview’s Ukraine Up-date- hop over to Scott’s amazing hourly Ukraine up-date page. I’ll fill in with some bits and bobs.
Royal Opera House: We're thrilled to be opening applications for new members to join our Ukrainian Chorus The programme provides Ukrainians living in London with the opportunity to meet and sing with other Ukrainians and artists from The Royal Opera
Stories we’re following…
Update on the Russian Iskander strike on Chernihiv: as of 11 p.m. local time, the number of wounded has risen to 144 people, including 15 children and 15 police officers, the National Police reported. The attack killed seven people.
Russian forces shelled the city of Kupiansk at around 7 a.m. local time on Aug 20, seriously injuring a man aged around 40, Kharkiv Oblast Governor Oleh Syniehubov reported.
Ukrainian pilots start training on F-16s, test flights on Swedish Gripen jets. Ukrainian pilots have already started a six-month training session on U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets, Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said on national television on Aug. 19.
Politico: Kuleba tells allies Ukraine needs long-range weapons, not forecasts. Ukraine isn't worried about Western pessimism toward its counteroffensive goals, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Aug. 19.
“We don’t need to prove anything; our success will reward optimists while ruining the reputation of doubters. “What we do need, though, is more long-range capabilities to achieve more short-term results,” Kuleba said.
Blast reported on premises of Interior Ministry site in Kyiv where experts examine explosives. Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko reported on Aug. 19 that an explosion occurred on the premises of the Interior Ministry's State Scientific and Research Expert-Criminalistic Center in Kyiv. According to Klymenko, the cause of the explosion is not due to a drone or missile strike.
Russia said Ukrainian drones had struck three separate regions on Sunday, injuring five people and forcing two of Moscow’s airports to briefly divert flights (an update from post at 07:31). Reuters reports:
Russia’s Kursk and Rostov regions, both of which border Ukraine, reported drone strikes while Russia’s defence ministry said it had jammed a Ukrainian drone in the Moscow region, forcing it to crash in an unpopulated area.
Russia’s aviation watchdog said it had briefly halted flights to the city’s Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports in response.
Kursk region’s governor said that five people had been injured and a fire broke out when a drone hit a railway station. Rostov’s governor said no injuries or damage had occurred.
Laying out his agenda for his visit to the Netherlands on Sunday, president Zelenskyy posted on Telegram:
Together with the first lady and the team, we arrived in the Netherlands. As always, we will have substantive talks with prime minister Mark Rutte.
The main issue is F-16 for Ukraine to protect our people from Russian terror. We are getting stronger. The agenda also includes the Global Peace Summit, the PeaceFormula, and bringing the terrorist state to justice.
The Netherlands will provide Ukraine with F-16 fighters. Prime Minister Rutte announced that the Netherlands has 42 aircraft and it remains to be seen how many can be delivered and when. He also mentioned that the Ukrainian airfields need to be ready to receive them.
"We need a number of them to help with the training in Denmark and soon also in Romania. We're going to see if we can supply the rest of the jets, but we don't yet know exactly how many we can deliver."
Denmark has confirmed it will supply F-16 jets to Ukraine.
"It makes me proud that Denmark, together with the Netherlands, will donate F1-6 fighter jets to Ukraine's fight for freedom against Russia and their senseless aggression. Denmark's support for Ukraine is unwavering, and with the donation of F-16 aircraft, Denmark is now leading the way," says Defense Minister Jakob Ellemann-Jensen.
Behind the lines
A Scotsman in Ukraine
A shout out to my dear Scottish friends (I have tons of them). Full tactical kilt for this warrior fighting for Ukraine with the 59th Brigade—location unknown. They were assaulted by the Russians, who took out one of their tanks and Humvee, but managed to regroup and take a strategic position at a crossroads of a landing, making it possible for the Ukrainians to move forward. You can watch the 59th in action here.
Russian media boasted that Ukrainian teenagers from temporarily occupied Mariupol, Khrestivka, Yenakiieve, Horlivka, Shakhtersk, Makiivka and Donetsk were taken to the Russian city of Penza to undergo "military-patriotic training" at the Gvardeets camp from August 1 to 18. Mariupol resistance reports that Ukrainian children were also taken to Saransk, where they were taken "to historical places of Russian glory" accompanied by "patriotic songs".
The number of battlefield casualties in Ukraine is approaching 500,000 Russian and Ukrainian soldiers, US officials have told the New York Times. The officials cautioned that casualty figures remained difficult to estimate because Moscow is believed to routinely undercount its war dead and injured, and Kyiv does not disclose official figures.
The Deputy Defence Minister in Ukraine, Hanna Malyar, explains why the number of war casaulties is not divulged:
Because during the active phase of the war, the enemy uses the number of dead and wounded to calculate our likely further actions.
The fact is that in military affairs, certain actions depend on the percentage of dead and wounded in relation to the total number of military personnel.
Accordingly, if these figures are known, the enemy can calculate our actions in advance.
It is not only about the total number of killed and wounded, but also about the number of losses of specific units and directions. Especially during battles. If the enemy has this information, they will begin to understand some of our next steps.
Information on the total number of killed and wounded during martial law is a state secret.
A very limited number of people have access to this information, who are duly warned of criminal liability for disclosure.
Monique: In conversation with an analyst, we estimated that there were close to 300,000 dead in Ukraine. The number includes Ukrainian military personnel killed in action and civilian deaths due to Russian actions. The number also includes the estimated deaths of the citizens of Mariupol, which most of the media have forgotten. I thought of my own province—Siena—completely devoid of human life: every hamlet, village and city, and all the people are gone.. That’s the entity of death and destruction we are talking about. This is also what would happen to the rest of Ukraine should it fall under Russian control.
Russia and its allies
Russian firms have received tens of thousands of Chinese shipments since the war in Ukraine began—The Telegraph
China is helping to arm Russia with helicopters, drones, optical sights and crucial metals used by the defence industry, a Telegraph investigation has found.
Russian firms – including sanctioned companies – involved in the production of missile launchers, armoured vehicles, and strategic bombers, have received tens of thousands of shipments from China since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began through the first quarter of this year.
It comes as China, which insists it remains neutral, is attempting to position itself as a key peace-broker in talks aimed at ending the conflict.
Trade between China and Russia is set to surpass $200 billion this year, a new record high, even as Chinese exports to other countries have fallen significantly.
Exports of goods with potential military uses rose by more than three times in the year which ended this June, compared to the one prior, according to analysis from the Observatory of Economic Complexity, a trade data visualiser.
Dual-use goods
Such goods are classified as dual-use, meaning they also have civilian purposes, allowing China to skirt international sanctions and claim that it conducts only legal trade with Russia. China’s support appears to be helping Russia weather sanctions, calling into question the effectiveness of a crucial part of the West’s campaign against Moscow aimed at crippling Russia’s economy. [continue]
Russia recruited operatives online to target weapons crossing Poland—WaPo
By Greg Miller, Loveday Morris and Mary Ilyushina, 18 August 2023
The cryptic job listings began appearing online early this year.
The tasks were menial — posting fliers or hanging signs in public spaces — and the pay meager. But for a handful of refugees from eastern Ukraine, the promise of quick cash was too good to pass up.
Respondents soon realized there was a catch: The jobs involved distributing pro-Russian propaganda on behalf of an anonymous employer. For those willing to complete the assignments anyway, the work then took a more ominous turn.
Within weeks, recruits were tasked with scouting Polish seaports, placing cameras along railways and hiding tracking devices in military cargo, according to Polish investigators. Then, in March, came startling new orders to derail trains carrying weapons to Ukraine.
Polish authorities now believe that the mysterious employer was Russia’s military intelligence agency, the GRU, and that the foiled operation posed the most serious Russian threat on NATO soil since Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine last year.
Russia’s objective was to disrupt a weapons pipeline through Poland that accounts for more than 80 percent of the military hardware delivered to Ukraine, a massive flow that has altered the course of the war and that Russia has seemed helpless to interdict, according to Polish and Western security officials.
Instead, the case has become another damaging blow to Russia’s spy services, whose unfounded assessments that Kyiv could be easily toppled shaped the disastrous invasion plan, and whose once-pervasive networks across Europe have been uprooted by waves of expulsions and arrests.
The plot in Poland marked an attempt to reverse this slide. Unable or unwilling to rely on its own operatives, Russia assembled a team of amateurs, including by using Russian-language postings on Telegram channels in Poland that are frequented by Ukrainian refugees, according to Polish officials, whose account was confirmed by their U.S. intelligence counterparts. [continue]
Wagner still using Facebook to recruit fighters, despite Meta saying content will be removed—Euronews
In late May, Meta said it had labelled Wagner as a "dangerous organisation," saying that content promoting the group will be removed from its platforms. A recent study found it's still there.
Wagner, Russia’s violent mercenary group accused of committing horrifying crimes and human rights abuses across the world in the past few years, is still using Facebook and Instagram to recruit people online, despite the fact that its content violates Meta’s policies.
A new study by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), an independent London-based nonprofit organisation researching and monitoring extremism and disinformation around the world, found that Meta has failed to remove content celebrating Wagner and containing recruitment information for the group, despite labelling them as a “dangerous organisation.”
In late May, Meta confirmed to Politico that it had identified Wagner as a dangerous organisation, as its social media platforms were revealed to be used to recruit fresh blood into Russia’s violent mercenary group.
“We designated the Wagner Group as a dangerous organisation, meaning it cannot have a presence on our platforms,” a Meta spokesperson told the newspaper, adding that content containing “praise or substantive support for Wagner” is also removed “when we become aware of it, including posts that aim to recruit for them.”
The organisation found a total of 114 accounts on Facebook and Instagram that were either impersonating or glorifying Wagner or posting recruitment content for the mercenary group.
The accounts posted in at least 13 languages including English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, Macedonian, Polish, Romanian, Indonesian, Vietnamese, and Russian.
The negative impact of these accounts cannot be underestimated. Fifteen of the 57 accounts found on Facebook had more than 10,000 followers or members as of August 16, while the 57 accounts found on Instagram had an amassed following of 10,175 users.
Some 23 of these groups shared information about recruitment into Wagner, calling it “the strongest private army in the world.” Crucially, some videos tried to convince potential recruits that they wouldn’t be cannon fodder for the group, but would be welcomed into the Wagner “family.”
In some videos shared on the Facebook accounts, on the other end, Wagner's leader Yevgeny Prigozhin could be heard declaring that the “Third World War” was near.
Besides posting Wagner-related content, the accounts also shared pro-Kremlin propaganda.
While the posts about recruitment, shared before the mutiny, contained information and contacts that appeared authentic, ISD could not find “any credible evidence” linking these Facebook pages, groups, and profiles directly to Wagner.
Update on Wagner
National Resistance Center: Wagner fighters leave Belarus due to low pay.
Over a thousand Wagner Group mercenaries have departed Belarus because they are unhappy with their pay, the National Restistance Center reported on Aug. 19.
The Belarusian underground registers a decrease in the number of terrorists from the "Wagner" military unit in the country from 5,800 to 4,400.
The reason is the lack of funding from the Russian Federation. Therefore, some of the mercenaries signed a contract and went to African countries, some went on vacation, but plan to either join other terrorist organizations or resign altogether.
Broke Lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis Prove Trump Will Never Run Out of Marks to Con—The Daily Beast
It’s easy to understand why Ellis was seduced into Trump’s orbit. She got to appear on TV and worked alongside “America’s Mayor,” Rudy Giuliani, to defend the President of The United States of America. For a young conservative lawyer, it’s hard to aim much higher than that.
But how do you explain Rudy Giuliani, Ellis’ senior “partner in crime” who claims to have pioneered the use of RICO back when he was a prosecutor, making the same rookie mistake?
In case you missed it, Giuliani, who is already in dire financial straits due to his various other legal bills, was also indicted in Georgia this week.
He reportedly made a personal visit to Mar-a-Lago to beg Trump for help. According to CNN, Trump “didn’t seem very interested,” although he verbally agreed to cover some of the costs (whatever that means).
The New York Times’ Maggie Haberman explained to CNN that Trump “didn’t want Giuliani paid unless Giuliani delivered on his promises, and obviously that didn’t happen.” (Presumably, Trump would only cover Giuliani’s legal fees if the attempted coup worked—in which case, Rudy wouldn’t have any legal fees.)
You don’t have to be a former mayor or legendary prosecutor to realize that you’d be left holding the proverbial bag.
“What happened to Rudy?” is one of the great questions of our time. Theories abound: he drinks too much, he needs a wife to keep him in line, etc. But a definitive explanation for the radical transformation doesn’t exist.
Recently, however, Giuliani biographer Andrew Kirtzman shed some light on this puzzling question. During an interview with MSNBC, Kirtzman noted that “Donald Trump literally took [Giuliani] into Mar-a-Lago right after his [presidential primary] failure in 2008 and kind of shielded Giuliani…”
One could imagine Trump occasionally practicing random acts of kindness—albeit in ways that do not involve him giving away his own money. (In keeping with this theory, to defray Rudy’s legal bills, Trump has “agreed to stop by two fundraisers for Giuliani.”)
Still, we’re left wondering: How did the guy who channeled Winston Churchill in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks later turn into the guy who held a press conference at Four Seasons Total Landscaping?
And why would the guy brave and canny enough to take on the mob be susceptible to The Donald’s charms?
“Donald Trump has a superpower: He gets people to believe he gives a crap about them and that if they work hard for his interests and exhibit loyalty, he will do the same for them in return,” writes Markos Moulitsas at Daily Kos. “And—this is key—Trump gets them to ignore the legion of broken, unpaid, and abandoned former contractors, employees, and allies he’s consistently left behind. Somehow, he convinces the next suckers that they’re different.”
Trump has honed gaslighting to an art form.
Ellis and Giuliani probably thought the rules didn’t apply to them—that they were different from the other marks floundering in Trump’s wake—that Trump was their friend. Presumably, they thought the con they helped perpetuate against the American public was limited to grifting other people. They thought wrong.
Programming note
Why is Ukraine giving up its Soviet symbols?