Russia Invades Ukraine. Again by captaincrunch

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Russia Invades Ukraine. Again

POSTED BY: CAPTAINCRUNCH
UPDATED: Thursday, June 25, 2026 13:07
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VIEWED: 510245
PAGE 211 of 211

Wednesday, June 24, 2026 4:56 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Yeah, I guess political economics is a puzzle to solve. That's my "sport“ (altho, I was pretty good at racquetball once upon a time).

That's what I figured on a second thought. Why would you pick a sport when what you did already was sport.

Interesting. I know very little to none about racquetball, so I can't even have an opinion on what that might mean. Care to give a brief description?

Quote:
I did originally come here for discussion. I was hoping to discuss some Big Ideas ... why society is like a living organism, or the misdirection that “efficiency“ builds into societies.

I kind of liked the other side of this place, but one day I eventually got sucked into the dark side of the RWED.

I always wondered if being here changed me, and if so, would it have happened somewhere else anyway if my brother never showed me this show.

Quote:
And I found a bunch of people who were way smarter than me but had their own Big Ideas. Well, I learned a few things.

Humble brag? I'll allow it.

Quote:
You have to be a little bit crazy to see what most people are trained NOT to see. I'm not even a little itty bitty bit crazy, so I have to depend on the craziness of others. (I find your new tagline interesting.)

You calling me crazy? You may be right.

Quote:
You can't believe you're so right that you dismiss other people's ideas without good reason. People dismissed Alex Jones and PN even tho there was real truth in a lot of what they said.

Anyway, despite his best efforts to convince ... who? ... I take a pretty "meta" view of SECOND. Which is to say, I'm not so interested in what he transmits (from others) as to why those others say what they say. Whose interests do they represent? So in some bassakwards way he's providing puzzle pieces, same way that other sources do.

THGR is just a lost cause. He's so completely brainwashed he has no agency. Not even interesting.

Yeah. The Ted-Bot is just a headline printer. Nothing going on upstairs anymore at all, I'm afraid.

Second is a little more interesting for sure, but he's such an evil little prick that I can't stand him even being around here most days. My "meta" with Second is that he's just become my barometer over the years. Whatever he thinks on any issue is the exact opposite stance that any reasonable person should have about that issue. Every single time.

There are articles put out there by all of the places he regularly posts from that I agree with. I've even gone out of my way and posted them here and commented that not everybody working at places like Vox is a mindfucked idiot cultist, but Second has never once posted a resonable article that Vox put out.

I used to care about trying to find the truth. 26 year old me would be pretty pissed off at 47 year old me for not bothering much anymore, but then again if 47 year old me could go back in time he'd be beating 26 year old Jack into the fucking ground for all of the very bad decisions that he's about to make and not pay for because it's 47 year old Jack that's paying for it, so 26 year old Jack can go fuck right on off with his opinion.

The Truth doesn't matter. The Truth is never going to matter. Though nobody important hardly ever goes down, even when they do they're just replaced with somebody worse. And they control the truth.

If The Truth mattered, we wouldn't see a Democrat elected to office on any level from Alderman on up to President until that party fixed itself. But we just saw that a bunch of minorities and white women doomed the state of New York with their primary votes last night.

Until we're in a war that hits all of us, which may be sooner than later if we don't take care of the Muslim problem all over the Western world, all that matters is the Perception of Truth.

--------------------------------------------------

Those who dance always seem crazy to those who can't hear the music.

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Wednesday, June 24, 2026 5:01 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK

If you see this, Sigs. Please do me a favor and watch this video. I think there are things on this topic that people have said themselves that you are not aware are being said...

If you don't want to or don't have time to watch the whole video, just start it at 7:54 and watch for a few minutes. I need you to see what I'm seeing.

Because that right there is the ONLY thing that currently concerns me.

This Russia/Ukraine bullshit is just a thing to keep your mind off the largest problem facing America at home.

Quote:
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
The Truth doesn't matter. The Truth is never going to matter. Though nobody important hardly ever goes down, even when they do they're just replaced with somebody worse. And they control the truth.

If The Truth mattered, we wouldn't see a Democrat elected to office on any level from Alderman on up to President until that party fixed itself. But we just saw that a bunch of minorities and white women doomed the state of New York with their primary votes last night.

Until we're in a war that hits all of us, which may be sooner than later if we don't take care of the Muslim problem all over the Western world, all that matters is the Perception of Truth.

And I'm hoping that the REAL TRUTH just comes crashing down on everyone much sooner than later, because at the rate the Muslims are going worldwide and right here at home, we're going to have a much larger problem as time goes on and this thing is going exponential rather quickly.

The only thing that makes me even a little happy about the very real possibility that the entire world might one day be living under a Muslim flag is that the white women in America and Europe who voted for it to all happen will be slaves.

But the worst part about that is I think most of them would actually enjoy it.

So fuck the rest of us.

--------------------------------------------------

Those who dance always seem crazy to those who can't hear the music.

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Wednesday, June 24, 2026 7:48 PM

SECOND

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

Russia says US hasn't followed through on Trump-Putin 'understandings'

By Mark Trevelyan | June 23, 2026 12:30 PM CDT

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-says-us-hasnt-followed-thr
ough-trump-putin-understandings-2026-06-23/

Summary

• Three senior Russian officials make similar complaint in three days

• Lavrov says Anchorage may have been US ploy to buy time for Kyiv

• Moscow's rhetoric shifts after frequent praise for Trump's diplomacy

LONDON, June 23 (Reuters) - Russia has accused the United States of failing to deliver on "understandings" reached between presidents Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump at a summit in Alaska last August, a shift that suggests growing frustration in Moscow.

In the space of three days, three senior Russian officials have said, without providing specifics, that Washington has not followed through.

. . . On Tuesday, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov suggested that the summit may have been a U.S. "ploy to buy time to rearm the Kyiv regime". . . .

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

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Wednesday, June 24, 2026 8:18 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK

You should watch that video at 7:54 for about five minutes too, you fucking dipshit.

--------------------------------------------------

Those who dance always seem crazy to those who can't hear the music.

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Thursday, June 25, 2026 8:06 AM

SECOND

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

The Kremlin is intensifying pressure on Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to expand Belarusian involvement in Russia’s war against Ukraine. Lukashenko continues trying to resist the Kremlin’s demands while maintaining Russia’s approval. The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on June 23, citing Russian and European officials, that the Kremlin is pressuring Lukashenko to allow Russia to more actively leverage Belarus in its war effort against Ukraine.[3] WSJ reported that the Kremlin is trying to sway Belarus into allowing Russian forces to launch drones against Ukraine from the Belarusian territory and extend the frontline westward to force Ukraine to redeploy troops from the frontline to the Belarusian-Ukrainian border. A former Russian intelligence officer briefed on the matter told WSJ that the Kremlin is threatening to withdraw financial support from Belarus in case of noncompliance. The Kremlin continues to frame Ukraine as a threat to Belarus. Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov claimed on June 24 that Russia will always stand by Belarus and repel threats against Belarus, including from Ukraine, as both Russia and Belarus are security and economic allies.[4] Zelensky’s report about how Belarus de facto responded to his ultimatum favorably by disabling repeaters indicates that Lukashenko continues resisting fully committing Belarus to the Kremlin’s military endeavor. Minsk is instead trying to balance maintaining Russian support for Belarus while maintaining what remains of Belarus’ degraded sovereignty.[5] Lukashenko has resisted allowing Russia to operationalize the Belarusian Armed Forces to support Russian operations in Ukraine or full-scale recruit Belarusians into the Russian military at scale since 2022.[6] Lukashenko and other senior Belarusian officials notably continue avoiding adopting the Kremlin’s framing that portrays Ukraine as a threat to Belarus.[7] Lukashenko continues to stall and deflect the Kremlin’s intensified attempts to drag Belarus into the war in Ukraine while maintaining relatively neutral rhetoric towards Ukraine.[8]

https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive
-campaign-assessment-june-24-2026/

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

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Thursday, June 25, 2026 8:49 AM

SECOND

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

Ukraine’s New Air-Power Paradigm

Putin says Russia is bound to win a war of attrition.
Recent developments cast doubt on his confidence.

By Jillian Kay Melchior | June 24, 2026 11:25 am ET

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/ukraines-new-air-power-paradigm-6edf1ad1

Vladimir Putin has been making the case that Russia’s battlefield advances are unstoppable and the outnumbered Ukrainians can’t win a war of attrition. It follows that Kyiv should settle before things get worse, even if it means surrendering the Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions. Ukraine’s latest moves, however, call this whole argument into question.

“We are scaling middle-strike operations to systematically destroy enemy logistics and supply lines,” Ukraine’s Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said on May 27, calling it “a ‘logistics lockdown’ for the Russian army.”

Senior Ukrainian military and political leaders began discussing a large-scale midrange strike campaign following the failed 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive. Former Defense Minister Andriy Zagorodnyuk consulted with Western advisers to develop an operating concept that circulated as a strategy document among senior government and military leaders. The details of this document, described here for the first time, offer insight into what Ukraine now seeks to accomplish.

Ubiquitous short-range drones have created a deadlock at the front. The West would use air power to cover its own troops and attack the enemy there, but Ukraine’s air force is more limited. Making a virtue of necessity, Mr. Zagorodnyuk’s operating concept describes a "new paradigm for air power” whereby Ukraine can achieve "the same effects” using "less sophisticated” means that are "much cheaper” but "equally effective.”

Midrange attack drones are the quintessential weapon of this new paradigm. A key goal is to "collapse the Russian military from behind,” says Phillips OBrien, a professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland and one of the Western experts who worked with Mr. Zagorodnyuk. Western military doctrine calls this “air interdiction.” It involves destroying, disrupting, diverting and delaying the supporting functions that prop up the enemy’s front line. Ukraine’s drones target Russian command posts, communication lines, ammunition and fuel storage, drone-control centers, logistics, and reserve forces.

Mr. Fedorov has said Ukraine "quadrupled” its interdiction strikes in recent months. In May alone, Ukraine hit 414 enemy headquarters, command posts and other important rear objects, said the top military commander, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi.

Ukraine is also ramping up long-range strikes on military and energy targets deep inside Russia. These mid- and long-range attacks are forcing the Kremlin to make tough choices about how to allocate air defenses—and what to leave exposed. At the front, the Ukrainians now have more short-range drones than the Russians. Together this is "achieving an operational effect we haven’t seen before at this scale,” says Kateryna Stepanenko of the Institute for the Study of War.

During a sustained interdiction campaign, “terrain-holding will become increasingly untenable for Russian ground forces who will be under-resourced from the rear and increasingly subject to attrition from the front,” the operating concept document predicted.

For the first time since 2023 Ukraine has started to liberate more ground than it’s losing, ISW said in May. Meanwhile Russia struggles with attrition: Finnish President Alexander Stubb told the Swiss newspaper NZZ this month there are now eight Russian casualties for every Ukrainian killed or wounded, up from three in December. Russia has suffered some 35,000 casualties a month in 2026 while recruiting only some 27,000 men, Mr. Stubb said.

Ukraine hopes to liberate all occupied territory including Crimea, but one interim goal may be to force Russia to demilitarize the peninsula, which it uses to stage aerial attacks, train forces and supply the front. Crimea “relies on a few vulnerable supply lines,” the operating-concept document noted. Ukraine has recently struck highways, railways and bridges on which Russia relies to sustain logistics to Crimea, as well as energy and transportation infrastructure and air defenses around the Kerch Strait.

Ukraine’s sustained attacks against Mr. Putin’s Black Sea fleet have already forced Russia to withdraw much of its navy from Crimea, and strikes on other Russian positions and assets could pressure Moscow to pull back even more. Keep this up and “from an asset, Crimea turns into a liability” for Russia, Mr. Zagorodnyuk tells me.

In the 2022 counteroffensive Ukraine used High-Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, or Himars, to strike the Russian rear, contributing to the collapse of Russian positions in Kherson and Kharkiv. But Ukraine has since run short on rockets for Himars, and Russians have gotten better at jamming and intercepting them. Ukraine also engaged in some drone-based air interdiction during its Kursk offensive. Mr. Zagorodnyuk is careful to note he was one among several military thinkers who have pushed for a broader air interdiction campaign, and I’ve long heard about ISW’s efforts to promote the same idea.

Several factors explain why it took Ukraine this long to do interdiction at scale. For starters, Kyiv had limited money for weapons and competing urgent needs, including drones for the front and air defenses. Europe has eased some initial restrictions that prevented Ukraine from using financial support to fund its military. Ukraine’s Defense Ministry and the General Staff have allocated more than $111 million for middle-strike procurement. Domestic manufacturers are now churning out firepower for the 15- to 125-mile range. Ukrainians are also improving their drones’ ability to withstand Russian electronic warfare.

In the summer and fall of 2025, an elite Russian drone unit known as Rubikon began conducting its own air interdiction campaign, targeting the Ukrainian rear. Rubikon was unique within the Russian military, but the Kremlin has struggled to scale up its operations. Still its successes were a wake-up call for Kyiv that interdiction needed to become a priority, several sources told me.

Ukraine got a prime opening in February, when SpaceX limited Russia’s access to Starlink, disrupting military communications. Additionally, Ukrainian soldiers are now experienced enough to carry out complicated combined-arms operations, a vital skill for midrange strikes.

“My goal, or the goal of our regiment, is to control the depth,” says Volodymyr Mirchuk, commander of the unmanned systems regiment Lava of the Khartiia Corps. “It’s a big operation.” It unfolds over several hours and involves many different kinds of drone pilots and surveillance and attack drones. Mr. Mirchuk says he watches these complex attacks unfold “like a football match” from screens in the command post. Each successful mission further isolates Russians at the front. "I'm enjoying it,” he says.

ISW says Ukraine now has the advantage and the initiative over Russia for midrange strike capability. This increases costs and risks for the Kremlin while weakening Russia’s negotiating position.

Ms. Melchior is a London-based member of the Journal editorial board.

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

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Thursday, June 25, 2026 9:40 AM

SECOND

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

France seizes Russian shadow fleet vessel in Mediterranean.

"We will not allow the shadow fleet to evade sanctions and fund Russia's war effort. Europe is determined," French President Emmanuel Macron wrote on X on June 25.

In addition to regularly sanctioning ships suspected of belonging to Russia's shadow fleet, which helps Moscow circumvent oil and gas sanctions, European countries are increasingly boarding the ships to stop them.

https://kyivindependent.com/france-seizes-new-russian-shadow-fleet-ves
sel-in-mediterranean/

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

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Thursday, June 25, 2026 9:44 AM

SECOND

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

Ukraine receives first tranche of 90 billion euro loan from EU.

June 25, 2026 2:10 pm

"The funds have already been transferred to the state budget and will be used to strengthen Ukraine's defense capabilities and social resilience," Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko wrote on Telegram.

https://kyivindependent.com/ukraine-receives-first-tranche-of-90-billi
on-euro-loan-from-eu/

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

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Thursday, June 25, 2026 11:56 AM

THG

Is also JJ. Keep it real please, and use a VPN

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

The reason why I'm so skeptical about 95% of SECOND'S and THGR'S second-hand claims is bc I follow Military Summary channel every day. Often twice a day. The PRO-UKRAINIAN host follows the drone strikes, frontline advances and retreats, official statements and Telegram channels in excruciating, granular detail. Every day. Twice a day!

More importantly, he backs up his reporting with geolocated videos. (I generally ignore his explanations and projections, tho, bc they're almost never correct.)

Simplicius the Thinker doesn't post anywhere near as often, but he backs up his points with videos that aren't found almost anywhere else, like videos of Israeli missile damage that Israeli officials strongly censor, or frontline videos that won't make it on YouTube bc they're too gruesome, or videos of new/ unusual weapons like the first Oreshnik strike, or the Ukrainian "Hollywood special fx drones" that are loaded with kerosene and rubber and create their own black smoke plume no matter what they land on.

Literally, the only time Kiev was correct was the claim of N Koreans fighting in Kursk.

-----------

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

Military Summary channel is located in Belarus. Don’t believe me? Go to the site. When at the site click on more information and listed in the popup amongst other shit, you will see their email address and where they are located. Belarus is listed comrade.

Second and I produce source after source as evidence of the truth. You promote this. A Russian bullshit propaganda source located in Belarus. No surprise here aye comrade? You use zerohedge and this shit source. You’re a clown.

They claim to be pro Ukrainian when all their posts are anything but. Just like you claiming to care about America while you promote the Russian perspective as the truth.

Fact, "When you focus just on Rural Russia, more than 60% of people don’t have indoor toilets with just under 50% using outdoor dunnies and the rest having no recognizable sewage system."

There's the good life for ya aye signym?

T

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Thursday, June 25, 2026 1:07 PM

SECOND

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

Ukraine turns to strangling Russian logistics on Crimea — and it's working

By Jimmy Rushton

June 25, 2026, 7:52 PM

https://kyivindependent.com/how-ukraines-drone-blockade-of-crimea-is-p
ressuring-russias-hold-on-the-peninsula/

A satellite image shows multiple smoke-generating vehicles operating on the Crimea Bridge, which crosses the Kerch Strait, on June 22, 2026, obscuring parts of the roadway and bridge. (Vantor / Getty Images)

Ukraine's siege of Crimea has been a long time coming.

Crimea is under an effective siege as Ukraine has been systematically isolating the occupied peninsula with a multipronged campaign of drone strikes. "Hell is beginning," Ukrainian Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said in a June 17 interview. "Logistics are being cut off. Crimea is being isolated." Ukraine plans to fully isolate the peninsula, cutting it off from Russian supply while destroying critical infrastructure — ultimately allowing the Russian occupation of Crimea to "wither on the vine".

The Ukrainian "blockade" has already led to severe fuel shortages, while long-range drone strikes on electrical infrastructure have led to power outages across the peninsula. Russian tourists have been heading home, while increasingly panicked Russian military bloggers attempt to sound the alarm over the situation in Crimea. "It is grave now, but promises to become critical in just a few weeks if the enemy continues its 'strategic air offensive' against it at an increasing pace," was the gloomy assessment of former FSB officer and convicted war criminal Igor Girkin.

Ukrainian strikes on Crimea are not new, but the current campaign marks a shift from sporadic attacks on high-value military targets to a sustained effort to make the peninsula harder to supply and hold.

Since April 2026, Ukraine's mid-range drones have been systematically targeting Russian traffic transiting along the R-280 — the so-called "Novorossiya highway" — as Fedorov's "logistics lockdown" swung into action. Ukraine has also been striking the ferries Russia uses to transport oil and military materiel across the Kerch Strait, the bridges that connect the peninsula to the occupied part of Kherson Oblast, and fuel depots, gas storage facilities, and electrical infrastructure in Crimea itself.

"Ukrainian strikes are increasingly shifting towards Crimea," Oksana Kuzan, co-founder of The Ukrainian Security and Cooperation Center, told the Kyiv Independent. "What began as the use of drones to sever key logistical arteries in Donetsk Oblast has evolved into a much larger operation."

This operation is already having a significant impact. After the oil terminal in Kerch was struck by Ukrainian drones on June 21, Russian occupation authorities declared a total ban on fuel sales to civilians. "Fuel will be sold only to government agencies that ensure the functioning and security of the Republic of Crimea," Russian-installed head of the Crimean Republic Sergey Aksyonov announced later the same day. In another attempt to "conserve fuel", Russian-installed governor of Sevastopol Mikhail Razvozhaev announced the mandatory closing of supermarkets, bars, and restaurants in the regional capital at 8 p.m.

Compounding Russian misery, Ukrainian drones struck the Simferopol Power Station and Sevastopol's main electric substation on June 24, leaving the regional capital and large parts of the peninsula without power. "The enemy is striking again, trying to deprive us of our usual living conditions and sow panic," Razvozhaev complained on Telegram.

Setting conditions for a logistics siege

Ukrainian strikes against targets in Crimea are nothing new. Since 2022, Ukraine has been slowly but surely forcing Russia to demilitarize the Crimean peninsula, hitting airfields, air defense sites, and naval bases. Since 2022, Ukraine has hit airfields, air defense sites and naval bases across the peninsula. The Saky air base in Novofedorivka was struck by mysterious long-range missiles in August 2022, the first significant attack on a Russian military facility on the peninsula. Seven Russian fighter jets were destroyed, and four were damaged.

Attacks continued in 2023, with Ukraine using R-360 Neptune cruise missiles to target and destroy Russian long-range S-400 air defense systems. Russian ships of the Black Sea Fleet were attacked with maritime drones and long-range missiles, while Anglo-French "Storm Shadow" cruise missiles dramatically destroyed the fleet's headquarters in their historical home base of Sevastopol. The constant Ukrainian harassment forced the Russian navy to relocate the Black Sea Fleet to Novorossiysk, around 350 km (220 miles) to the east.

Since 2025, Ukrainian long-range drone units, particularly the "Prymary" special operations unit of Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR), have been hunting Russian military targets — particularly air defense systems and radars — across the peninsula.

"Ukraine has focused heavily on degrading Russian air defense systems, not just in Crimea but across all occupied territories," Kyle Glen, an investigator at the Centre for Information Resilience, who has been tracking the Ukrainian and Russian drone campaigns, told the Kyiv Independent.

"The destruction of these systems has paved the way for Ukraine's middle strike campaign on logistics in the south and also successful long-range strikes on targets in Crimea and in Russia itself," Glen said.
The drone blockade

Ukraine's attempted "drone blockade" is a new tactic, enabled by the degradation of Russian air defenses and facilitated by Ukraine's new fleet of cheap, mainly domestically produced, mid-range drones and loitering munitions. Russia heavily relies on road-borne logistics transiting the Novorossyia highway to supply fuel and military materiel to sustain its occupation of Crimea, as well as to supply Russian troops occupying parts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts. Indeed, the creation of a "land bridge" to Crimea was a key Russian war objective.

Military cargo traffic on sections of the route had decreased by 71% in the preceding two weeks, head of Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces Robert "Magyar" Brovdi said on June 9. In the face of the Ukrainian drone threat, the Russian military has been instituting a convoy system — where groups of tankers are escorted by mobile anti-aircraft teams — and dedicating significant numbers of personnel to anti-drone duty.

It doesn't seem to have helped much, as videos of numerous Russian logistics vehicles being destroyed by the Unmanned Systems Forces and a host of other Ukrainian military units are published on a daily basis. The mobile anti-aircraft teams themselves are frequently victims of Ukraine's prowling drones.

"Ukraine appears to have sufficient capacity to keep bridges and other key logistics pathways disabled."

Russia will struggle to meaningfully counter Ukraine's swarm of small, inexpensive, and mass-produced drones, Michael Bohnert, a defense researcher at the RAND Corporation, believes.

"The Ukrainian campaign is very sustainable," Bohnert told the Kyiv Independent. "Ukraine's Hornet drone costs up to $5,000, the Darts drone costs about $2,000," Bohnert said, explaining that the cost of each drone was significantly less than the cost of a Russian man-portable surface-to-air missile, and around the same cost as a burst of proximity-fused shells for a heavy anti-aircraft gun. "Ukraine seems to have enough capacity for sustained strikes," Bohnert said, something that wasn't true even a year ago.

Bridges, ferries, and chokepoints

As well as targeting individual trucks, Ukraine is also attempting to destroy the transportation links that connect Crimea to Russia and to Russian-occupied Ukraine: railway links, bridges, and ferries. This campaign is also having significant success.

Multiple road and rail bridges connecting the peninsula to occupied areas of Kherson Oblast have been repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian drones, destroying at least one and heavily damaging at least three others.

Satellite imagery shows severe damage to the Henichsesk road bridge, now seemingly unable to be used by any traffic, while the Chonhar road bridge was heavily damaged, with one lane completely closed to traffic. In both cases, Russian military engineers have been constructing pontoon bridges alongside the concrete structures.

Ukraine had previously targeted the Chonhar road bridge using Storm Shadow cruise missiles in 2023, doing significant but ultimately repairable damage. Limited stocks of the expensive Anglo-French-supplied missiles meant that a sustained campaign of air strikes was impossible; Ukraine's domestically produced drones have changed that calculation — if the drone strikes cannot completely destroy the bridges, they can at least damage them sufficiently to make the passage of heavy military equipment and large civilian logistics vehicles impossible.

"Ukraine appears to have sufficient capacity to keep bridges and other key logistics pathways disabled," Bohnert told the Kyiv Independent. "Ukrainian counter bridge drones like the Behemoth cost less than $50,000, and several are needed to take out bridges. But these are well below the $2,000,000 price tag of a Storm Shadow cruise missile." Crucially, they are also manufactured in Ukraine, ensuring a consistent supply, and have no political strings attached.

Ferries across the Kerch Strait have also been targeted. Traffic across the Kerch bridge is heavily restricted, with fuel tankers, military logistics, and other heavy cargo traffic forced to use ferries to cross the strait. Russia has banned the transit of fuel tankers and other heavy goods traffic across the Kerch bridge; fearful of a repeat of the Ukrainian attack in October 2022, which saw a truck bomb detonate alongside a railway tanker loaded with fuel oil, causing a blazing fire and the collapse of multiple spans of the road bridge.

On April 8, drones operated by the HUR's Department of Active Operations struck the "Slavyanin" railway ferry, doing significant damage to the vessel and knocking it out of action. Later satellite images showed the vessel tied up in a dock, listing heavily, its bow half underwater.

The "Panagia" and "Lavrentiy" ferries — which the Russians had been using to transfer military equipment from Russia to Crimea — were struck on June 21, causing ferry services to be suspended. Ukrainian sources claimed another unnamed ferry was also targeted in the same attack. Any heavy traffic that is unable to use ferries to cross the Kerch Strait therefore has to take the R-280 coastal road and run the gauntlet of Ukrainian drones.

As bad as the situation is in Crimea right now, it could always get worse.

Russian military bloggers are now openly worrying about another Ukrainian strike on the Kerch bridge itself, which was opened by Vladimir Putin in May 2018 and is now surrounded by anti-aircraft guns, smoke generators, and multiple layers of maritime obstacles, designed to protect it from attack by the air or the sea.

Can pressure on Crimea force talks?

Kuzan believes that Ukraine's success in isolating Crimea will aid attempts to force Russia to re-enter the negotiation process. "If Ukraine is not already seizing the initiative from Russia, it is at least laying the groundwork for doing so," Kuzan said. "Conditions that will ultimately force Russia to sit down at the table for a genuine negotiation process."

Hanna Notte, a Russia expert at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, told the Kyiv Independent that while Ukraine could inflict significant "economic pain" on Russia, both in Crimea and in Russia more generally, the prospect of Russia agreeing to a ceasefire because of Ukrainian pressure on Crimea was unlikely.

"I think developments in Crimea eliciting a specific response by Russia are only going to happen if the Ukrainians are able to threaten Russia's hold on Crimea," Notte said, adding she didn't believe the Ukrainians currently had the ability to threaten Russia's ultimate control over the peninsula.

"Our operation, including the one concerning Crimea, is carefully calculated," Ukrainian President Zelensky said in his nightly address on June 24, claiming that if Ukraine receives support promised by Western partners during the recent G7 meeting, "we will promptly create the conditions that will force Russia to choose peace."

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

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