Russia Invades Ukraine. Again by captaincrunch

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Russia Invades Ukraine. Again

POSTED BY: CAPTAINCRUNCH
UPDATED: Monday, April 27, 2026 06:12
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Friday, April 24, 2026 8:05 AM

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Ukrainian forces continue to strike Russian air defense assets in Russia. Ukrainian Unmanned Systems Forces (USF) Commander Major Robert “Magyar” Brovdi reported that Ukrainian forces struck a Russian Tor-M2 air defense system in Bryansk Oblast overnight on April 22 to 23.[20]

Brovdi stated that Ukrainian USF drone operators have struck a total of 22 Russian air defense systems in Russia and occupied Ukraine thus far in April 2026.

https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive
-campaign-assessment-april-23-2026/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, April 24, 2026 8:28 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Russia spent 20 years hardening Ukraine by accident. Europe won’t get that gift.

Two decades of hybrid pressure built the Ukraine that stopped Russian tanks in 2022. Moscow has drawn the lesson. NATO’s eastern flank should assume it has months, not decades.

By Olga Chiriac, Nicholas Krohley | 24/04/2026

https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/04/24/russia-spent-20-years-hardening
-ukraine-by-accident-europe-wont-get-that-gift/

For more than twenty years, Russia ran an unrelenting hybrid warfare campaign against Ukraine—patient, sustained, multi-dimensional. It was, in the end, self-defeating.

European governments have spent the same twenty years preparing to be on the receiving end of something like it. They may not get twenty years. Moscow has now watched where that playbook led—a hardened Ukrainian military, a society that cohered under pressure, a war Russia is losing—and has every reason to reach for something faster against NATO's eastern flank.

Russian methods in Ukraine were varied and overlapping: political subversion, economic pressure, cyberattacks, information operations, and the slow corruption of a political class.

Narrowly judged, it worked. Ukraine's economy was repeatedly disrupted. Its politics were penetrated. Donbas tied down the military, produced refugees, and absorbed national attention. Western investors kept their distance. Moscow pursued clear objectives and "red lines"—sometimes strategically, sometimes opportunistically, almost always patiently. Ukraine stayed poor, divided, and, as the Kremlin read it, manageable.

Manageable is not subdued. That is where the doctrine broke.

(NATO’s generals warn of war by 2029. Europe won’t be ready until 2035.
https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/04/07/natos-generals-warn-of-war-by-2
029-europe-wont-be-ready-until-2035/ )

By 2022, Moscow had concluded that hybrid pressure would not deliver what it most wanted: keeping Ukraine inside the Russian orbit and out of Western institutions. The Euromaidan revolution, the EU Association Agreement, deepening military cooperation with NATO and the United States—all of it pointed in one direction, and the direction was away.

So Russia abandoned the "sub-threshold" game and reached for what it thought would settle the question: a full invasion.

What it hit was not the hollowed-out state twenty years of pressure were supposed to have produced. It was a country that had been forged by that pressure. Ukraine had rebuilt its military—much of it on Western assistance unlocked, ironically, by Western alarm over Russia's hybrid aggression. It had hardened its networks. It had walked its energy sector out of Russian dependency. Civil society had the institutional reflexes and grassroots muscle that come from two decades of adversarial pressure.

The citizens, by the time the tanks moved, had already decided what kind of country they wanted. Putin—this is the line everyone repeats now—turned out to be the greatest catalyst of modern Ukrainian nationalism. A nationalism fully cut loose from its Soviet past. With, at this point, no meaningful tie to Russia or Russianness.

Kyiv was supposed to fall in three days. Four years on, Ukraine is still fighting. The hybrid attacks have not stopped—the power grid gets hit again every winter—but Ukrainians have absorbed that into daily life and not shifted on the fundamentals. At the political level, Zelenskyy has shown a maturity few expected, most recently by closing a deal with Saudi Arabia in the middle of a war in Iran. Kyiv is behaving like a serious Western player. The EU, by contrast, is being mocked for its statements of concern.

It would be naive to think Moscow has not absorbed what happened here. Prolonged hybrid warfare, however tactically satisfying, risks making your eventual enemy stronger. It gives them time. It gives them reasons. It hardens institutions. It builds international sympathy, and sympathy, eventually, becomes materiel. If the goal is conquest or capitulation, patience may be the worst option on the menu.

(Ukraine fired its NATO trainers. The alliance is running out of time to learn why.
https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/03/31/ukraine-fired-its-nato-trainers
-the-alliance-is-running-out-of-time-to-learn-why/ )

And the ground has shifted in ways that make faster action easier to imagine, not harder. The rules-based order that imposed at least some friction on overt territorial aggression is unraveling in real time. The current American administration has shown, across several files, that unilateral action in pursuit of national interest is an acceptable instrument again and sometimes a productive one. How Moscow reads all this is still unclear. The signal it is receiving is not. Decisive action is back on the table. "You can just do things," as the phrase goes now.

A core driver of Soviet grand strategy during the Cold War was the fear of surprise. The Nazi invasion of June 1941 and the Great Patriotic War remain foundational experiences—for the state, and for the people. Hardliners in Moscow are gaining ground, and they may yet shift the calculus of a president who has so far leaned on the language of deterrence and strategic restraint.

European planners should be treating this convergence with more urgency than they currently are. If Russia turns next to the Baltic states, or Finland's long border, or another soft edge, there is no reason to assume it will slow-play the way it slow-played Ukraine.

Twenty years of probing before committing? Why would the Kremlin hand a second adversary the same gift?

The decades of pressure that accidentally built Ukrainian resolve and Ukrainian capability will not be extended to NATO's eastern flank. European governments, militaries, and critical infrastructure operators need to achieve in years—perhaps in months—what Ukraine built over decades. Tallinn and Helsinki do not have twenty years. They may not have two.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, April 24, 2026 1:27 PM

THG

Keep it real please, and use a VPN

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Ukraine will never get on its feet until it tackles corruption. Same with India. Same with the USA. When the monied get control of government nothing good happens.

-----------

"It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal."- Henry Kissinger

You mean like Russia, right comrade?

T

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Saturday, April 25, 2026 7:58 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

EU just held its first summit without Orbán, and discovered his obstruction was covering deeper divisions

Without him in the room, diplomats acknowledged behind closed doors that Orbán had long absorbed the blame for conflicts that were never really his alone.

By Olena Mukhina | 24/04/2026

https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/04/24/eu-just-held-its-first-summit-w
ithout-orban-and-discovered-his-obstruction-was-covering-deeper-divisions/

This week’s EU summit in Cyprus took place in a noticeably calmer atmosphere without Viktor Orbán, who is set to leave office after losing the election. For 16 years, he had been one of the main sources of tension within the European Union, Politico reports.

However, his absence did not resolve underlying issues — if anything, it exposed them.

Europe without “convenient scapegoat”

Diplomats at the summit acknowledged behind the scenes that Orbán had long served as a kind of scapegoat for internal conflicts.

Now, without him, the EU is forced to confront its differences more openly and honestly.

1. Ukraine: fast-track membership or cautious realism

One of the first major divisions emerged over Ukraine’s EU membership. Some leaders support accelerating Kyiv’s integration, while others urge caution.

Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, speaking in the presence of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, emphasized the need to consider “realities”, a signal that consensus remains out of reach.

2. Energy under pressure: sanctions or economic survival

Another sharp debate focused on energy policy. Europe faces a dual challenge:

• fuel shortages amid escalating tensions around Iran

• the need to maintain and strengthen sanctions against Russia

This creates a direct dilemma between economic stability and political commitments.

3. Endless debates: budget, strategy, and future of EU

Even without Orbán, EU leaders continued lengthy discussions over budget priorities, development strategy, and the Union’s long-term direction.

In effect, the summit demonstrated that the EU’s core problem is not individual politicians, but deeper structural divisions among member states.

4. Russia plays its violin at the Cyprus meeting

Earlier, the Center for Countering Disinformation reported that Russia is attempting to organize staged protests in Cyprus aimed against EU policy, the decision to allocate a €90 billion loan to Ukraine, and to discredit President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The “protests” are reportedly planned to run through 25 April under the guise of anti-war slogans. However, this reflects a typical Russian tactic of shifting responsibility for the war onto Ukraine, the EU, and NATO. The central message is expected to demand an “immediate halt to EU funding of the war in Ukraine.”

Through such provocative actions, the Kremlin seeks to undermine support for Ukraine and trigger divisions within the European Union.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Sunday, April 26, 2026 6:30 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

“We lack a theory of victory for Ukraine,” said Claudia Major, a defense expert with the German Marshall Fund. The idea was to put enough pressure on Russia to change its calculus, “but we never gave the Ukrainians enough to do that. Now we just try to keep the Ukrainians in the game until something in Moscow changes — someone dies or is thrown out the window or the economy collapses. But it’s not a strategy.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/25/world/europe/ukraine-russia-europe-
european-union.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Sunday, April 26, 2026 7:01 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

The New Revolution in Military Affairs

How Ukraine is driving doctrinal change in modern warfare.

By Andriy Zagorodnyuk
Published on Apr 20, 2026

https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2026/04/ukraine-russia-war-chan
ging-warfare-practice-military-strategy

____________

I would read the whole piece as it's detailed and extremely well reasoned.

It is fascinating to see Ukrainian thinking expand on this subject. They are now, arguably, the intellectual leaders in devising machine-based modern war strategies. You can learn far more from them than from reading what is being written by American think tanks and defense leaders on the subject.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Monday, April 27, 2026 6:12 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Ukrainian action thriller billed as Saving Private Ryan for the drone age

Killhouse is based on real-life story of civilian couple saved from battlefield by Ukrainian drone operators

By Luke Harding | Sun 26 Apr 2026 00.00 EDT

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/apr/26/ukrainian-action-thrille
r-billed-as-saving-private-ryan-for-the-drone-age

It is being billed as Ukraine’s answer to Saving Private Ryan, updated for an age of drones.

The war movie Killhouse is an action thriller which shows off the latest in battlefield technology. Released this week, it features cameos by figures well known in Ukraine, including the nation’s former military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov. One missing person is Donald Trump. The film is conveniently set in 2024, when Washington and Kyiv were allies.

Its director, Liubomyr Levytskyi, said he was inspired by a real life story, when a couple trying to rescue relatives came under Russian attack. The man was badly wounded. A Ukrainian military unit nearby sent in a drone with a piece of paper. It said: “Follow me.” The woman followed the drone, dodging mines and bullets. Russian soldiers threw her unconscious husband into a trench. Incredibly, he survived.

“A friend of mine, a journalist, rang me and said: ‘Liubomyr, I’ve got this story – it’ll give you goosebumps.’” Levytskyi said. He added: “I was like: ‘Well, of course it will. I’ve seen so many of these stories already.’ It’s very hard to impress me with a story. Then I saw footage from the rescue operation. I couldn’t believe my eyes that this is real.”

The director made a 30-minute documentary, Follow Me, which he said got wide attention. “I realised that this story really strikes a chord, and people get it. Drones in general, well, they’re something new. And I thought, right, this story needs to be made into a film.”

The ensuing two-and-half hour film was shot last year in the Kyiv region. Levytskyi said he took artistic licence with the plot, adding a 12-year-old girl kidnapped by Russians. Scenes take place in the White House situation room, in occupied eastern Ukraine and a farmhouse in a deadly grey zone. There is a shootout and car chase in downtown Kyiv.

The US journalist Audrey MacAlpine – who plays a version of herself – said filming had to stop on several occasions. “There were air raid alerts. We had to hide. It was a war within a war,” she said. The actor Denis Kapustin said some cast members would nap in a bomb shelter, waiting for the threat to pass. Of the blurring of fiction and reality, he said: “The movie is totally meta and postmodern.”

Kapustin said Killhouse captures the complicated multi-level nature of war today. “It’s a race for technological superiority,” he added. Soldiers took part alongside professional actors, with pyrotechnics used to simulate explosions. After filming ended, Kapustin joined the real-life unit in which his character serves, the 3rd Assault Brigade, a part of the 3rd Army Corps.

He is now a drone operator. In one scene, a group of Ukrainian special forces soldiers clear a building, shooting dead many Russians. Kapustin acknowledged that the war is fought at a distance across much of the frontline, but said street-to-street fighting takes place in shattered eastern towns such as Vovchansk. “It’s realistic. The plan is not to lose people,” he said.

The reaction from Ukrainian audiences has been positive. “It’s interesting to see people from the news such as Budanov on screen,” Mariia Hlazunova, who worked for the Dovzhenko Centre, Ukraine’s film archive, said at this week’s Kyiv premiere. She added: “It’s like fiction mixed with fact. The film is super-patriotic, which is as it should be. There are a few cheesy moments. Overall it does a really good job.”

Ukraine’s two main intelligence agencies, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), and the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine (DIU), were involved in the production. They provided US Humvee and MaxxPro vehicles as well as a Black Hawk helicopter. The drama showcases Ukraine’s latest homemade drones, such as a catapult-launched reconnaissance model known as Shark.

The film’s makers say it is the first feature in cinema history to be use footage taken by real combat drones. They are preparing an English-language version for distributors in the US and are considering creating a four-episode version for streaming platforms such as Netflix. Killhouse was made without state support and had a $1.1m budget.

Like Saving Private Ryan, the story has a moral question at its heart: is it worth sacrificing many lives to save one person, in this case a stolen child? According to Ukraine’s army media unit, Killhouse depicts “something the world often misses in the daily flood of frontline updates”. “Ukrainian soldiers are not just fighting to hold territory. They are crossing into grey zones to bring civilians home,” it said.

Levytskyi suggested that the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, badly underestimated Ukraine’s resilience and will to survive when he launched his 2022 full-scale invasion, thinking his armed forces could overwhelm Kyiv in a few days. More than four years later, the war continues. “The enemy is very afraid when Ukrainians are united. That is a fact,” the director said.

Additional reporting by Jake Jacobs

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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