🇺🇦 President Zelensky said Russian troops have begun the “battle for the Donbas” region, marking a major new offensive in the 54-day war. A significant part of Russia’s troop presence in Ukraine is concentrated in the Donbas for the offensive. I’ll provide more info when I get it.
🇺🇦 (Pictured) Google Maps has open to the public access all satellite imagery of all Russian military installations. This is already leading to some hilarity / jokes / speculation that a lot of Russia’s equipment appears to be nothing more than styrofoam. This just happened, so I don’t have high fidelity information, but I’m sure this data will start pouring in as us open source intel people pour through these images
🇺🇦 (Pictured) The Moskva on fire.
🇺🇦 Russia has likely taken Mariupol. They likely took it 4/16, despite denial from the Ukrainian General Staff. There might still be a few pockets of Ukrainian soldiers left but they will likely be cleared out. The only way to retake Mariupol is with a counter offensive
🇺🇦 Russian forces continue to amass in the Izyum area in easter Ukraine
🇺🇦 The Russian forces that amassed in the Izyum area launched small scale attacks and were unsuccessful
🇺🇦 Putin has promoted the brigade responsible for Bucha massacre to “guard brigade” this is the 2nd highest level of promotion. As noted before, war crimes (scaring the population into submission) are part of Russia’s military doctrine. This is a consistent theme in Russia’s military engagements (see Syria and the prior Ukraine invasion for the latest examples)
🇺🇦 Russia used a missile to strike the World Central Kitchen in Kharkiv. This was a humanitarian aid food distribution run by a well known hunger activist and celebrity chef, Jose Andres. Like… what depravity exists when you use one of your last precision-guided missiles to destroy non-combatant humanitarian relief center?
🇺🇦 Russia is making 100,000 forcibly-deported Ukrainian children to go through “retraining camps” in Russia
🇺🇦 Captured areas are going through “filtering”. Pro-Russian civilians are moved to impoverished areas in Russia.
🇺🇦 French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen claimed that if she were president, she would cooperate with Russia after the war
🇺🇦 Ukraine claims they have taken back two towns in the Kharkiv region, and made progress on two more.
🇺🇦 Russia is blocking the Human Rights Watch website. It’s like…pop quiz, how can you tell your country is on the wrong side? When they block the Human Rights Watch website.
🇺🇦 Russia is increasing arrests of people they think are responsible for failures in Ukraine. For example, Russia thought the 3rd Motor Rifle Brigade was 100% staffed, but it was only 55% staffed, and the commanders were lying.
Mariupol
🇺🇦 Though Mariupol has fallen this apparently does not mean that Russia has taken the city there’s now a citywide and insurgency happening. The base of operations is still the Azovstal factory.
🇺🇦 There are rumored to be 1,000 civilians still hiding in the factory.
🇺🇦 The factory is under constant shelling.
🇺🇦 Russia has taken all of the tactical locations in the city. However, fighters are still attacking from within the city.
⚠️If anyone cares, I post updates in the afternoon, then immediately start writing the next update. That means some of the data is 24 hours old, some of it is minutes old.
⚠️ If you ever hear anyone say “What about America…” in an effort to redirect attention away from Ukraine and onto America, that is called “Competitive victimhood” and the associated meme is *always* created by Russian-backed media. Russia has three primary propaganda efforts directed at the West, and that’s the third.
⚠️ Note: I’m getting lazy with my citations and I apologize. It’s all the same sources as it’s always been…NATO planners, official statements, major news, other open source researchers, people who send me leads, reputable pundits like Aaron Parnas, Kyiv Independent, Institute for the Study of War, etc. Thank you especially to CP Scott, former Army and former NATO planner.
⚠️ These posts are not affiliated with my employer, nor done during my employer’s time. Every item I report is from my own research and my own opinion.
⚠️ Note: War happens fast and even high fidelity news needs a ton of corrections after the dust settles. Also, I’ve been spoiled by social media’s format where I can update the final product every time I find a typo. While that’s still the case, that poses a problem when…
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