May 5: E-Stories
RUattacksUA POWs CombatSit BehindLines InRussia Allies Georgia China A&P Halushka UKDef ISW UkrainskaPravda NoelReport Rehi Hansen Bendett Waller Kallas Kapparov Weiss TimesRad Buziashvili Mikiashvili
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.
Eyes on Ukraine and in Georgia:
The next few weeks will be extremely difficult for the Ukrainian forces in the east as Russian forces will push to gain more territory. This is due to the fact that lethal aid to Ukraine was held up in the States, and that the EU member states moved too slowly to make up for those armaments and defensive weapons. We allowed the Russian forces to stockpile materiel, strengthen their position, and did not provide the air defences necessary to thwart the strikes against infrastructure and civilians in Ukraine’s north east and south east. I’m critical because this means loss of Ukrainian lives and livelihoods, and an overall weakening of the security architecture in Europe.
Since December the Russians have also increased non-kinetic attacks against the West: namely, GPS jamming in Europe’s north west, sabotage attacks in Germany, the UK, and the U.S. and political warfare in the guise of disinformation campaigns. We’re catching the spies who are working for Russia, China and other totalitarian states, but I really hope those tasked with domestic security of our infrastructure are taking the necessary steps to protect these sensitive locations.
E-Stories is also keeping an eye on our friends in Georgia, who continue their protest on Day 20, saying “No Russian Law!”. Georgia’s place is with us in the EU, and acting in its own interests, and not in Russia’s as the Georgian Dream would have it. I hope the EU and the U.S. won’t drop the ball again when it comes to providing support for our Georgian friends standing up for their democracy and institutions.
For now the EU, US, and the UK are “deeply concerned about this legislation - what it could do in terms of stifling dissent and free speech," U.S. national security spokesperson John Kirby said during a press briefing.
Stories we’re following…
Russian attacks against Ukraine kill 5, injure 17 over past day. Russia targeted a total of eight Ukrainian oblasts — Chernihiv, Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Sumy, Kherson, Kharkiv, and Donetsk. Casualties were reported in the latter three regions.
Governor: Russian missile attack on Odesa Oblast injures at least 3. The attack damaged civilian infrastructure in the Odesa district, according to Odesa Oblast Governor Oleh Kiper.
Olena Halushka: "Mom! I'm wounded, in the hospital. Doctors left. My leg is broken and face torn. Vitalik died. Nadia is in the hospital basement. Help!"
This was the last plea from Mariupol resident Kateryna. On March 29, 2022, russian invaders shelled their home, killing her husband. Someone brought her to the hospital, but russians targeted it too, causing a big fire.
Everyone feared she perished there on April 2. She survived & managed to pass that note to her mother through an unknown man. The mom arrived and spent the next two days with Kateryna, holding her hand when her daughter succumbed to her serious wounds on April 4.
How can a human endure such horrors? There are so many similar stories that the world will likely never hear since no one survived to testify the truth. Letting russians get away with crimes like this will only embolden them for more genocides.
Ukrainian representatives at Eurovision 2024, Alyona Alyona and Jerry Heil, have started a fundraiser to rebuild a school in the Dnipropetrovsk region! Its left wing was completely destroyed by Russia in 2022. Support the initiative here.
Combat Situation Update
Russian and Ukrainian forces clashed a total of 74 times today, with Ukrainian forces repelling 18 Russian assaults on the Avdiivka front alone, General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reports on Facebook.
Over the course of today, Ukrainian aircraft carried out airstrikes on seven clusters of Russian military personnel, three command posts, two air defence systems and an ammunition storage point. Units of Ukraine’s air defence intercepted a Kh-59 guided air-to-surface missile.
Commander: Russia aims to completely occupy 3 oblasts in 2024. Russia's goal in 2024 is to completely occupy Donetsk, Luhansk, and, if possible, Zaporizhzhia oblasts, Ukraine's Ground Forces Commander Oleksandr Pavliuk told The Times on May 2.
Zelensky: Ukraine facing 'new stage' in war as Russia preparing to expand offensive. Ukraine is facing "a new stage" in the Russia's full-scale war, President Volodymyr Zelensky said during a meeting with border guards in Khmelnytskyi Oblast on May 3.
Military intelligence general: Chasiv Yar's fall probably a matter of time. "Not today or tomorrow, of course, but all depending on our reserves and supplies," a military intelligence deputy head, Major General Vadym Skibitsky, said in an interview with The Economist published on May 2.
US-based company Feloni Aero launches the newest line of advanced attack drones Felon 1.0 and FelonX to strengthen Ukraine's defense capabilities. The Felon 1.0 carries a 5.56 mm caliber weapon while the FelonX is capable of firing the world's smallest anti-tank missile, the Spike (analogous to the FGM-148 Javelin).
Soldiers of the 110th Mechanized Infantry Brigade shot down a Russian Su-25 in the Donetsk region.
Military intelligence carries out cyberattack in Russia's Tatarstan. The attack reportedly targeted internet providers and mobile operators in the Russian republic.
A large scale fire can be seen in occupied Crimea, near the village of Luhove northeast of Yevpatoriya. The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed a total of 4 ATACMS were shot down over the peninsula overnight.
Vehicle traffic on the Crimean Bridge is temporarily blocked. In Berdyansk, Melitopol, Tokmak, Mariupol there is missile danger.
In a new interview with The Economist published on Friday, Ukrainian deputy intelligence chief Vadym Skibitsky gives an assessment of the situation at the front, calling it “as difficult as [it’s] ever been since the early days of Russia’s full-scale invasion” and predicting even worse days ahead.
According to Skibitsky, Russia plans to continue its push to capture the entirety of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions. In the immediate future, he says, the Kremlin has ordered the army to “take something” either by Russia’s Victory Day holiday next Thursday or before Putin’s trip to Beijing the following week. Kyiv’s problem, meanwhile, is “very simple” in Skibitsky’s assessment: “We have no weapons.” Depending on how long its current supplies last, Skibitsky predicts Ukraine will soon lose control of its elevated fortress in Chasiv Yar, which would pave the way for Russia to advance on the rest of the Donetsk region.
Meanwhile, the general says, Russia appears to be preparing for an offensive further north, around Ukraine’s Kharkiv and Sumy regions. He predicts this push will start in “late May or early June.”
Skibitsky says that May will be “the key month,” with Russia planning to execute a “three-layered” plan to destabilize Ukraine. The first layer will be a military assault as Moscow seeks to take advantage of the lag between the U.S. Congress approving aid to Ukraine and that aid arriving on the battlefield. At the same time, Russia will wage a disinformation campaign aimed at “undermining Ukrainian mobilization” and Volodymyr Zelensky’s “political legitimacy.” Finally, the Kremlin will ramp up its effort to isolate Ukraine from its allies.
Behind the Lines
Russian students studying in Finland detained on suspicion of exporting dual-use goods. Three Russian students studying in Finland were detained for allegedly exporting unspecified dual-use goods - items that are suitable for military capabilities, Finnish outlet Yle reported on May 3.
Ambassador: Washington doesn't support strikes with US-made weapons in Russia. Washington wants to help Ukraine defend itself, but does not support strikes with U.S.-made weapons on Russian territory, U.S. Ambassador Bridget Brink said at a meeting with journalists on May 3, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL).
The Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs has put Zelenskyi on the wanted list under the Criminal Code article, state agency RIA reports.
White House does not currently see China open to Ukraine's peace formula. "That is why, for our part, we will continue to be concerned about Zelensky having everything he needs," U.S. national security spokesperson John Kirby said.
Foreign Ministry: Ukrainian citizen stabbed to death in Budapest. A Ukrainian citizen died as a result of a knife attack in Hungary's capital, and the suspected attacker has been detained, Ukraine's Foreign Ministry confirmed for Ukrinform on May 3.
Who’s arming Russia? The graph shows that China is the main supplier of arms to Russia as expressed in 1000s of transactions.
According to ISPI’s review of data, sanctions have not curtailed Russia’s capacity to import war materiel. These figures show that there is an implicit "alliance" between China and Russia, at least on a strategic and military level, which has strengthened over the last twelve months. Formally, Beijing continues to reiterate its neutrality in the conflict. At the same time, China is reluctant to invest in the Siberian II pipeline that should bring gas to the east.
April 2—U.S. Department of State—Official Readout and Advisory
Today the Department of State, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the National Security Agency are releasing a Cybersecurity Advisory on a new tactic the DPRK cyber group known as Kimsuky is deploying to enhance its social engineering and hacking efforts targeting think tanks, academic institutions, non-profit organizations, and members of the media. The DPRK’s exploitation of improperly configured DNS Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance (DMARC) record policies allows the DPRK to spoof legitimate email sender domains in order to conceal spearphishing attempts more effectively.
Kimsuky, a group of cyber actors within the DPRK’s military intelligence organization, the Reconnaissance General Bureau, conducts large-scale social engineering campaigns intended to manipulate and compromise victims for the purpose of intelligence gathering.
This joint Cybersecurity Advisory provides detailed information on how Kimsuky actors operate, warning signs of spearphishing campaigns, and mitigation measures to enhance network security and DMARC policies to protect against Kimsuky operations.
Meanwhile in Russia
US intelligence: Putin spends record amounts on military over 'paranoid fear' of West limiting Russia's power. "Putin continues to believe that Russia is under threat and almost certainly assumes that a larger, better-equipped military will convey that opinion to Western and domestic audiences," Director of U.S. National Intelligence Avril Haines said.
Russian armed forces motivational video: All of you will die, but you know one thing: Mother Russia will never forget us! Flowers will be carried on our gravestones for centuries. Our names will be engraved on commemorative plaques. And there will be an eternal fire for us!
In a recent conversation with Olga, she mentioned that the more Russian soldiers die at the front the better for Putin and the regime: this way they can put up monuments to the dead all over Moscow and St Petersburg. The more the merrier. Their mentality is totally divorced from ours.
How Russia is dealing with rouble devaluation: In late April, the Russian government extended a decree requiring exporters to exchange most of their foreign currency earnings for rubles on the domestic market. Officially, these measures aim to “preserve the stability of the exchange rate.” However, despite these efforts, forecasts for the ruble paint a grim picture. Although the currency has somewhat stabilized at around 90 rubles to the dollar, even Russia’s own Economic Development Ministry predicts a potential weakening to 100 to the dollar by next year.
Reporters Without Borders’s latest Press Freedom Index, published Friday, ranks Russia 164th out of 180 countries, two spots higher than last year.
Samuel Bendett: Over the past several months, I was working on a public report on the latest Russian AI developments - it is now published with the Center for a New American Security.
The Role of AI in Russia’s Confrontation with the West
Developing strong, pragmatic and principled national security and defense policies.
The report is meant as a summary of the latest developments through March 2024, and should serve as a reference document for anyone interested in major Russian thoughts and deliberations on AI in the military domain.
The data is based on public sources and major Russian announcements and debates on what artificial intelligence should mean for the country's defense, security, military and civilian establishments. We caveat such statements as coming from official sources and should be treated as such.
The report's backdrop is Russia's disastrous Ukraine invasion, which influences how the Russian military considers AI development and use, even if actual use cases are very far and few in between (if at all). Nonetheless, Russia has demonstrated that it can conduct WW1-style, casualty-intensive ground warfare backed by modern technologies like newest aerial drones.
The report lays out how the Russian MOD thinks about AI, where its AI development/use priorities are, and how Russia's civilian AI ecosystem can assist that effort. The report also includes a listing of possible international partnerships on AI that the Russian government is currently pursuing. The text was meant as a summary document and does not delve into the technical side of Russia's AI R&D.
Given the ongoing technology race that Russia sees itself in vs. US, China, Ukraine and other countries, the Russian MOD does allocate resources to AI R&D, even if results cannot be seen right away.
Allied Support
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has launched a new USAID Harvest programme to support Ukrainian grain and oilseed producers in expanding their exports, committing over US$250 million to rebuild and expand Ukraine's agricultural sector.
The US is in talks with partners to lead a group of allies to provide up to $50 billion in aid to Ukraine. The idea is that these funds will be returned at the expense of profits from Russian assets that have been frozen and are accruing interest.
Media: Italy to give Ukraine SAMP/T system in new aid package. The Italian government is readying its new defense aid package for Ukraine that will include, among others, a SAMP/T air defense system, the Italian news outlet La Repubblica reported on May 2.
German company to deliver 6 more TRML-4D radars to Ukraine. Hensoldt, a German defense manufacturer, will provide Ukraine with six more TRML-4D radars by the end of 2024, the company said on May 3.
Ukraine’s president and foreign minister has pressed British foreign secretary David Cameron to accelerate the delivery of promised military aid to Kyiv, as Russia heaps battlefield pressure on depleted Ukrainian forces in the third year of war.
“It is important that the weapons included in the UK support package announced last week arrive as soon as possible,” Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on the social platform X, as Cameron visited Kyiv on Thursday.
The German opposition expressed irritation at the laughter of Chancellor Olaf Scholz after answering a question about the supply of Taurus missiles to Ukraine.
"Of course, I trust my friends. But I wouldn’t give everyone all the weapons," Scholz said after which he started laughing.
Sharp criticism comes from the CDU: "It is absolutely shameful that the Chancellor is giggling and laughing at the expense of Ukraine. The giggling Chancellor is insulting people who fought for their survival in Ukraine and also for our freedom," CDU General Secretary Carsten Linnemann said.
Matthias Ecke, a leading Socialist member of the European Parliament, was left ‘seriously injured’ and in need of surgery after being attacked by a group of four young men in the eastern German city of Dresden, according to a press release issued by his party Saturday. Matthias Ecke, 41, was assaulted on Friday evening while putting up posters in the Striesen district, his party said. He is the Social Democratic Party’s (SPD) top candidate in Saxony for June’s European Parliament election.
Svitlana, you were an editor working for RIA-Melitopol before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Can you tell us more about the general situation in Melitopol before the invasion, and about your work back then?
Svitlana Zalizetska, a Ukrainian journalist from Melitopol, Zaporizhzhia region, has been writing about life in her city under Russian occupation for over two years. Even now, living in the part of Ukraine not under Russian occupation, she is under constant pressure from Russian aggressors who continue to threaten her, her family, and her colleagues. Despite this, she continues to share stories about life under Russian occupation. Svitlana says that if she were to stop, she would betray her colleagues, so she continues her work for them. We talked to Svitlana about her work during the occupation, the terror that the Russian occupiers spread, and the challenges that journalists in the occupied territories currently face.
Eto Buziashvili interviewed on CNN: "Men in black... without any identification marks, cracking down and beating students, children..." Eto Buziashvili on the growing Russian influence in Georgia, as demonstrators protest a controversial "Russian Law"
Georgian president accuses government of being 'prone to making concessions to Russia.' Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili was referring to the controversial foreign agents law, known popularly among its opponents in Georgia as the Russian law, which Georgian Dream is attempting to pass in parliament.
Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili escalated her criticism of the ruling Georgian Dream party in an interview with Deutsche Welle on May 3, directly accusing the government of being "prone to making concessions to Russia."
"It is increasingly clear that it is not just the 'Russian law' that is the problem, the problem is the Russian government," said Zourabichvili.
The protest continues in Georgia: a woman making an appeal to the riot police.
Atlantic Council: Yin-yang diplomacy. Chinese leader Xi Jinping's upcoming visit to France, Serbia, and Hungary has geopolitical observers eager to parse the signals coming from all sides, a year into the EU's efforts to "de-risk" from China.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is expected to join Xi and Macron in Paris on the first day of the visit. Léonie Allard, a visiting fellow in our Europe Center from the French Ministry of Armed Forces, says this will be vital to projecting a unified EU approach. But as Brussels-based expert Roderick Kefferpütz puts it, the big question is whether Xi has anything attractive to offer. "Will the emperor bring gifts, such as Chinese participation in the Ukraine peace conference, reduced material support for Russia, and greater economic opportunities for the EU?"
Is China policing France? Alerted in advance, Envoyé Spécial was able to follow and film a clandestine operation by the Chinese police in Paris.
Safeguard Defenders published a long report in 2022 about the presence of Chinese police authorities that have opened stations under the guise of cultural centres in the West. This latest release documents further extensive evidence of the establishment by local PRC Public Security authorities of at least 102 “Chinese Overseas Police Service Centers” in 53 countries around the world and how some of them have been partaking in the execution of "persuasions to return" operations. Patrol and Persuade (PDF) also documents the (silent) complicity of a number of host countries, instilling a further sense of fear into targeted communities and severely undermining the international rules-based order.
The Washington Post: Hope Hicks testifies about the state of the 2016 campaign during the hush money saga: Hicks was part of Trump’s inner circle since 2015. She hasn’t had any major falling-out with Trump. That makes her a reliable witness, legal experts say.
Hicks testified Friday that the “Access Hollywood” tape got more news coverage than a Category 4 hurricane hitting the East Coast around that time, reports The Post’s Devlin Barrett. “I don’t think anybody remembers where or when that hurricane made landfall. It was all Trump, all the time, for the next 36 hours,” Hicks said.
Times Radio: How China Spies on the U.S. Nigel Inkster joins Frontline to explain how China spies on the West and its allies.