The Low-Down

Moscow Military Festival Cancelled For Fear of Ukrainian Drone Attacks

2026-08-23T08:06:06.917-04:00

Another embarrassment for Putin as a military festival he commissioned almost 20 years ago is cancelled over fears of Ukrainian drone attacks - and Russia's inability to stop them. JL

Daria Zakharova reports in Politico:

A major military festival in Moscow has been canceled four days before it was due to start. The event, which began in 2007 at President Vladimir Putin’s orders, is one of Russia’s most prominent military-themed events, alongside the May 9 Victory Day parade in Moscow and the Navy Day show in St. Petersburg. The move comes amid an increase in Ukrainian drone attacks on the Russian capital.A major military music festival in Moscow has been canceled four days before it was due to start, the organizers said on Telegram. The lavish parade, known as the Spasskaya Tower International Military Music Festival, attracts thousands of visitors and brings together dozens of military bands in the heart of Moscow on Red Square near the Kremlin.

The event, which began in 2007 at President Vladimir Putin’s orders, is one of Russia’s most prominent military-themed events, alongside the May 9 Victory Day parade in Moscow and the Navy Day show in St. Petersburg. Spasskaya “Tower was only canceled once before — in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In its early years, military bands from EU countries, Australia and Canada took part in Spasskaya Tower, though the number of international participants has declined since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

According to the festival’s Telegram channel, “the event has been postponed until 2027 due to circumstances beyond the organizers’ control.”

The move comes amid an increase in Ukrainian drone attacks on the Russian capital.

Overnight, Kyiv’s forces launched one of the largest assaults on Moscow in recent months, with more than 600 drones directed toward the Russian capital and surrounding region. The strikes, which, according to Russian media, targeted the facilities of Wildberries, a major Russian online marketplace, as well as logistics warehouses, sparked massive fires and killed one person.

Earlier in June, the Kremlin canceled another event in Moscow’s Red Square — a gala concert marking Russia Day. The Victory Day parade on May 9 was held on a limited scale and, for the first time in nearly 20 years, without heavy military equipment.

Ukraine Is Winning Escalating Space War With Russia

2026-08-23T07:46:18.910-04:00

Ukraine is increasingly hitting Russia's aero and outer space production and storage assets as the Kremlin uses them for targeting Ukrainian cities.

Kyiv's identification and striking of these targets has seriously damaged Russia's ability to use space as a military resource because the lead times for building these complicated and expensive facilities are so long. JL

Kevin Platt reports in Forbes:

Ukraine's bombing of a major Russian space rocket assembly center is the latest in a growing barrage of missile and drone strikes on the Kremlin’s aerospace labs. “While Russia is targeting purely civilian infrastructure and sites” across Ukraine, killing citizens and children in the process, “Ukraine is restricting its strikes to military or dual-purpose targets.” Ukraine’s attack on the Progress Rocket and Space Center, in western Russia, triggered a major setback for the Russian space program. The center produces the Soyuz rockets, for decades the main Russian boosters to launch space capsules destined for the International Space Station and imaging satellites that track U.S. defense worldwide and the movement of Moscow’s own tanks and missile brigades around occupied Ukraine.
Ukraine’s bombing of a major Russian space rocket assembly center is the latest in a growing barrage of missile and drone strikes on the Kremlin’s aerospace labs, say leading American experts on Russia’s military and space operations.
Four years after the Kremlin started blasting Ukraine’s so-called Rocket City of Dnipro, including a spacecraft skunkworks, Ukraine is stepping up its retaliation, with aerial assaults on a constellation of Russian space-tech outposts, including some on the periphery of Moscow, says Elena Grossfeld, a scholar at the King’s Centre for the Study of Intelligence at King’s College London.
Part of the skyrocketing Space War I, Ukraine’s attack on the Progress Rocket and Space Center, in western Russia, might have triggered a major setback for the Russian space program.
The center produces the Soyuz series of rockets, for decades the main Russian boosters to launch space capsules destined for the International Space Station and imaging satellites that track U.S. defense outposts worldwide and the movement of Moscow’s own tanks and missile brigades around occupied Ukraine.
Ukraine's leading-edge cruise missile hit the pivotal rocket and space center that produces Russia's Soyuz series of rockets, which launch space capsules to the ISS and imagery satellites that track U.S. defense outposts worldwide and Moscow's own tanks and missile brigades in occupied Ukraine. Shown here is a Soyuz booster being transported to a launch site. (Photo by STR/AFP via Getty Images)
AFP via Getty Images
Grossfeld told me in an interview that Ukraine’s latest missile strike represents the newest ramp-up in its campaign to target the Kremlin’s most important space operations, especially those tied to its military and war objectives.
“This latest attack on Russian space-related manufacturing is just another step in a long series,” she says.
“The main research center of Roscosmos [the Russian government-run spacecraft corporation] in Korolev (a Moscow suburb) was hit earlier this month.”
“Space communications centers have been hit, including in Dubna (another Moscow suburb) in June 2026, and additional centers have been similarly hit.”
Moscow’s recovery from these multiple strikes could be stymied by the broad barriers on tech exports to Russia that have been imposed by the Western democracies following the invasion of Ukraine.

That means Roscosmos will have to resort to searching for spacecraft components and advanced chips in the nefarious underground black market, Grossfeld says.
In an earlier strike, a kamikaze drone was despatched by Ukrainian pilots to destroy a leading-edge radio telescope that Ukrainian scientists had designed for communications across missions to Mars and Venus.
But the telescope was captured by invading Russian troops during their takeover of Crimea, and they adapted it to refine their GLONASS satellite navigation system, “to be used for military communications,” says Victoria Samson, Chief Director, Space Security and Stability at the Washington-based think tank Secure World Foundation.
Samson, a globally renowned expert on the leading potential space conflicts of the future at a think tank that specializes in proposing solutions to maintain peace in orbit, told me in an interview that a spiraling space war is now seeing “an expansion of the types of facilities that are being targeted.”
Russia launched this space war on the very same day its tanks and troops began crashing across the border into Ukraine, she says, when the Kremlin’s notorious military intelligence directorate began attacking the ground stations of the American satellite network Viasat.
Ukraine’s president and military leaders all used that network to organize the embattled nation’s defense, and they would have been decimated if SpaceX founder Elon Musk hadn’t launched a high-speed Berlin Airlift-like operation to rush thousands of life-saving Starlink terminals to plug Ukraine back into the Web.
When Russia launched its space war attack on U.S. Viasat terminals that Ukraine's president and military chiefs used to organize the embattled nation's defenses, SpaceX founder Elon Musk raced to speed his Starlink satellite terminals into the blitzed democracy. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
Getty Images
The Progress Rocket and Space Center, Samson says, “does build the Soyuz rockets that are being used to launch Russia's (limited) version of Starlink, Rassvet.”
Ukraine’s freedom fighters are equipped with Starlink terminals that give them a remarkable military advantage in communications and navigation over the Russian invaders.
So Moscow now aims to loft its own version of Starlink, but “they are very far from being able to get the constellation launched in its entirety,” Samson says.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has hailed the strike on the space center in a post on X: “Our plan of long-range sanctions against Russia for this war is being implemented, and it is important that Russia’s war potential be reduced.”
Zelensky also lauded the development of Ukraine’s new FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile, which precisely hit the target space outpost 900 kilometers beyond Ukraine’s border with Russia.
The iconic head of Ukraine’s resistance and worldwide hero of democracy added that a parallel aerial assault hit the Savasleyka airbase, “where the carriers of Russian missiles that strike our cities and villages are based – about 700 kilometers from Ukraine.”
“With Ukrainian deep strikes capabilities improving,” says Elena Grossfeld, “no Russian region can be safe, and of course, space facilities and manufacturing are targeted.”
Ukraine is stepping up its aerial assaults on space centers across Russia. (Photo by Sven Creutzmann/Mambo photo/Getty Images)
Getty Images
“While Russia is targeting purely civilian infrastructure and sites” across Ukraine, killing countless citizens and children in the process, she adds, “Ukraine is restricting its strikes to military or dual-purpose targets.”
When considering missile strikes on space centers, she says, “If the facility is manufacturing equipment used for military communications, it is my understanding that it becomes a legitimate military target.”
“The space war has been ongoing since the beginning of Russian invasion,” Grossfeld says, but playing out across a terrestrial theater.
As European members of NATO race to build up their space defenses, the world is waiting for the first armed clash to be staged in orbit, even as Russia conducts a clandestine project to arm an anti-satellite missile with a nuclear warhead.
At the same time, the United States has begun masterplanning its Golden Dome orbital defense system, a fantastical shield against nuclear ICBMs and ASATs that could cost more than $1 trillion.
As the ground segment of the space war speeds up, Grossfeld says, and as Ukraine perfects the navigation and autonomy of its killer drones and cruise missiles, “Any damage to existing facilities … makes Russia’s space operations, whether launches, or satellite production or others, more risky, expensive, and complicated.”
“Ukraine is pulling ahead in all its strikes - not just on space.”
“Since both sides now view space as a necessary domain for waging war, the strikes on Russian space-adjacent facilities and industries are likely to continue."
Meanwhile, the King’s College London scholar, who has written extensively on Moscow’s advances and setbacks in military space projects, says while Russia has been waging a space war against Ukraine, it has also ignited a shadow space war against the U.S., in the Middle East.
Russia is likely providing Iran with sophisticated satellite intel that is aiding the Islamic Republic’s drone strikes on American missile defense systems across the Mideast, assaults that have hit U.S. radar installations and THAAD missile interceptors, Grossfeld told me in an earlier interview.
She also points out that President Zelensky has said he has evidence that Russia supplied the precise coordinates for an Iranian attack on a U.S. Air Force AWACS surveillance aircraft stationed at Saudi Arabia’s Prince Sultan Airbase.
Zelensky outlined that evidence in a series of posts on X, and then in a video interview with NBC News.
Russia’s imaging satellites could have provided targeting info for all these aerial assaults, she says, as part of a joint Russian-Iranian space war against the West.
At the same time, Russia has improved the aeronautics of Iran’s “Shahed drones used against the U.S. military in the Gulf.”
Russia has been improving the technology of Iran's drones, and supplying it with satellite intel to target American defense outposts across the Mideast, as these rogue powers stage a space war against the West (Photo by Mohsen Shandiz/Corbis via Getty Images)
Corbis via Getty Images
So, she added, “Yes, the space war is ongoing.”
“But it has been a Cold War of sorts until now, as no satellites have been blown out yet.”
“Still, if you look at what Russian military bloggers and propagandists are saying, there are demands for Russia to inflict kinetic damage on Starlink, and other U.S. space assets.”
Just as the Cold War I competition between the Soviet Russians and the Americans revolved around their race to build the planet’s biggest stockpile of thermonuclear weapons, Russia’s next pivot in the new space war might be to equip its already tested Nudol anti-satellite missile with a nuclear warhead.
The Kremlin’s atomic ASAT could stalk and threaten all of the Western spacecraft in low Earth orbit, and could, with just one detonation, destroy great swaths of America’s trillion-dollar Golden Dome orbital defense system, along with SpaceX’s Starlink satellite constellation, Samson says.
A thermonuclear blast in orbit could simultaneously wipe out most satellite communications worldwide, take out American missile tracking systems, and kill all the astronauts aboard the International Space Station and the Chinese space station.
Scholar Samson says that if the U.S. government detects the nuclear-armed ASAT on a Russian launch pad, it could send an elite squad of Special Operations forces to destroy the space super-bomb before it is ever lofted.

Ukraine's Infantry Is Adapting to A War Of More Menacing Drones

2026-08-22T09:52:35.692-04:00

The key to winning and survival is adaptation based on intelligence and planning.

The result has been lower Ukrainian casualty levels despite increased success in advances against Russian held territory. JL

Tamar Jacoby reports in Washington Monthly:

The main activity is planning - a new kind of detailed forethought required by drone warfare. A trio of screens dominates a corner -16 flickering feeds from friendly UAVs in the area. This isn’t a drone command center—the feeds have become essential to planning- intel that guides the dangerous slog to and from the trenches, supply runs, and battlefield ops. Robots haven’t replaced soldiers. “Drones or no drones, infantryman is still the hardest job in the army.” Two recent innovations - heavy multicopter bomber drones and those piloted by fiber optic cables - demand the biggest adjustments on the ground. The steepest new challenge is distance - the vast, growing gray zone between the rear and the line of contact. Recruits are guaranteed 14 weeks of training or more. Every significant battlefield operation is followed by an after-action review to identify mistakes and improve planning. “We used to be afraid of Russian artillery. Now we don’t even think about it.”

The simple farmhouse north of Kharkiv—Ukraine’s second-largest city, just 20 miles from the Russian border—serves as the base of operations for an infantry company of the Ukrainian 13th National Guard Brigade, known as Khartia. One room is filled with bunk beds, and the walls are hung with helmets and body armor. In the yard, sacks of food and crates of ammunition sit under a laundry line dangling fatigues and T-shirts. But this is more than just a soldier’s billet. The main activity here is planning—a new kind of detailed forethought required by drone warfare.
Both Russian and Ukrainian use of drones has changed dramatically since the war began nearly three and a half years ago. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) now come in all shapes and sizes. Both sides use widely diversified drone arsenals for scouting and striking enemy forces. Long-range drones terrorize Ukrainian cities and destroy oil depots deep inside Russia. Others with shorter ranges buzz overhead, night and day, on the front line.
These smaller drones, ever-present eyes and weapons in the sky have transformed the battlefield, creating a six-to-12-mile “gray zone” between Russian and Ukrainian lines. It’s a deadly no man’s land where no one dares risk exposure. Even tanks and armored vehicles hesitate to cross the desolate territory for fear of drones. Instead, small groups of attacking Russians dash in on motorbikes, drawing fire to expose Ukrainian positions. And virtually everything the foot soldiers of Ukraine’s infantry once knew about fighting—assault and defense—has changed.
For the Khartia infantrymen I saw working from the converted farmhouse, the evolving technology makes their job simultaneously easier and much more perilous.
Formed in 2022 as a volunteer civil defense unit, Khartia played a leading role in the battle for Kharkiv in the first three months of the war, helping to beat back the Russians from the city’s gates. Superior training and technology helped the brigade emerge as one of Ukraine’s most celebrated elite units, attracting celebrity volunteers and joining some of the war’s bloodiest battles, including Bakhmut and Soledar.
Known from the start for its infantry units, Khartia has also been at the forefront of wartime innovation. In December 2024, it mounted a historic, fully robotized assault. Dozens of unmanned ground and aerial vehicles—some with machine guns, others designed to lay and clear mines—attacked enemy troops massing north of Kharkiv. There were no flesh-and-blood Ukrainians on the battlefield, and according to the brigade, Russian losses were significant.
But robots haven’t replaced soldiers yet, and the infantry company at the farmhouse was among the first units to enter the fray after the unmanned attack. Five hours of futuristic shock and awe prepared the way for five months of grueling human combat as the company pushed the enemy back toward the Russian border, yard by yard. “Drones or no drones,” the unit’s master sergeant, who goes by the code name Doc, explained grimly, “infantryman is still the hardest job in the army.”
A slight, sad-looking man with a dark beard and black glasses, Doc has watched drones evolve since the war’s outset—growing bigger, with better cameras and longer-lasting batteries, greater range, and more capacity for explosives. Today’s Ukrainian drones can detect advancing Russians many miles away. But the opposite is also true, and the Ukrainian company is in constant danger of Russian strikes from above.
“We used to be afraid of Russian artillery,” the company commander, a beefy older man code-named the Czech, explains. “Now we don’t even think about artillery.” It’s much easier to aim a drone and call in a strike than to maneuver and fire these big, long-range guns—Stalin called them the “god of war”—that once helped decide infantry battles.
Two recent innovations—heavy multicopter bomber drones and those piloted by fiber optic cables rather than radio waves—demand some of the biggest adjustments on the ground. For the Khartia unit, the steepest new challenge is distance—the vast, growing gray zone between the farmhouse and the line of contact.
Instead of riding in an armored vehicle to a spot a few hundred yards from the fighting and sprinting, soldiers trudge up to 15 miles to remote positions. They make the trip far less often—it’s too dangerous—and this, in turn, poses a host of other challenges: finding new ways of masking frontline positions, longer stretches in the trenches, more frequent runs on longer supply lines, and ever-more dangerous evacuations of soldiers wounded in battle.
The new distances have even created new jobs. As recently as a couple of years ago, there was no need for soldiers like the unit’s guide, Monatik. (His code name is borrowed from a popular Ukrainian singer.) A chubby, good-natured man from the Kharkiv region who knows the local roads, he shepherds fighters to and from the unit’s distant frontline positions. “We go as rarely as possible,” he says. “We can’t afford the risk.” The usual duration of a shift in the trenches, once a few days, now often runs over a month.
Inside the farmhouse, the unit’s fresh-faced young deputy commander, who goes by the call sign Myth, shows me how drones are changing the front line. A trio of screens dominates a corner of the living room—16 flickering feeds from friendly UAVs flying in the area. This isn’t a drone command center—the men in the farmhouse aren’t manipulating the drones on the screens. But the feeds have become essential to their planning—information that guides the dangerous slog to and from the trenches, supply runs, and battlefield operations.
Three kinds of UAVs supply pictures on the day I visit: expensive reconnaissance drones, small first-person-view strike drones, and a new, heavier “Vampire” bomber. We scan all 16 feeds and then zero in on one as it follows a road through an empty field. Myth is planning the route that an armored vehicle filled with supplies will take to the line of contact that evening, under the cover of darkness. “We used to use maps,” says Doc, the master sergeant, sitting nearby. “This is much better—much more information. It’s also easier to show the men who will make the trip. We can point them exactly where to go and predict at least some of the problems they’ll face.”
It’s a slow day, and the men seem in a good mood, joking about the names they call enemy soldiers. One uses a slur, and the others scold him playfully: “Not in front of a foreign journalist!” Myth picks up the joke and runs with it, scanning the feeds for human life. “Look,” he says suddenly, pointing to a fuzzy spot in the middle of the screen, “a person from the Russian Federation.” They all laugh, but then some kind of shock jolts the image, and we watch a small dot fly away from the fuzzy spot. We’ve just watched a drone strike, and the Russian is dead. “That’s a bit of his skull,” Myth explains.
The Khartia brigade goes to great lengths to protect its fighters. Recruits are guaranteed 14 weeks of training or more. That’s more than twice as long as the 45 days most Ukrainian soldiers get. Management techniques borrowed from NATO have flattened the chain of command to encourage initiative and input from soldiers at all levels. Every significant battlefield operation is followed by an after-action review to identify mistakes and improve planning. Virtually all the men I speak to at the farmhouse underline the point. “We do everything we can to save lives,” Doc tells me. “That’s the most important thing.” And it pays off. According to him, despite the danger, the unit has lost just .5 percent of its fighters since it arrived at the farmhouse over a year ago.
It’s unclear how much this assuages the men’s fear. A new, gap-toothed recruit code-named Intelligent seems thrilled to have joined the unit, chattering about the training and the camaraderie. But his mood changes abruptly when the talk turns to drones. “There are just so many of them, all the time,” he explains. “It’s terrifying.” Monatik, the scout, agrees: “People are much more frightened. We try to jam conventional drones, and we shoot down the ones controlled by optic fibers or try to catch them in a net. But sometimes—too often—there’s nothing you can do. You just sit and listen. What’s coming is coming.”
Asked about the costs and benefits of the drone revolution, the men are divided. Ruslan, a young officer fresh from the National Guard training institute, is sure the new weaponry helps more than it hurts. “The more technology, the better,” he says. Czech, the middle-aged commander who has been in the armed forces off and on since 2014, isn’t so sure. “Drones mean 99 percent more work,” he says, “and everything takes more planning—much more planning. In a way, that’s good—drones help you see further ahead. But you can’t foresee everything.”
I try asking again: When was it better to be an infantry fighter—before or after the new technology of unmanned aerial vehicles? But the old soldier dodges my question: “Peace is better.”

The Real Trap of Pokrovsk Is Russia's Inability To Extricate Itself and Advance

2026-08-22T09:14:15.309-04:00

Remember Pokrovsk? The Russian military sure does. Because it has been unable to turn its bloody, eventual capture of that smoking heap of rubble into operationally significant advances.

The Russians remain mired in draining combat around Pokrovsk, as Ukrainian units force them to continue to commit substantial resources, including elite airborne troops. This means that the ultimate trap of Pokrovsk, which breathless western observers once opined would be the end of Ukraine has now become a tar-baby from which the Russian military cannot disengage, meaning that it cannot mass enough forces to generate breakthroughs elsewhere as Ukraine hits other weakened Russian sectors. JL

Owen Warner reports:

The real “trap” of Pokrovsk was never a dramatic physical encirclement. It was that Russia would spend an extraordinary amount of combat power taking the city, only to discover that the battlefield beyond it remained just as difficult. Russian forces seized Pokrovsk but failed to turn the capture into operationally significant advances. Despite the capture of the city, Russian troops achieved modest gains around the perimeter. On August 7, there were 192 combats across the front, with the Pokrovsk sector having the most. On 12 August, 237 clashes were reported on the front, many again in Pokrovsk and Kostiantynivka. Months after the city fell, Russian troops were still fighting through the surrounding sector. Collapse had not followed. Ukrainian forces continued contesting attacks, disrupting infrastructure, and forcing Moscow to commit substantial combat power. Pokrovsk had fallen. The battle for what came after Pokrovsk had not.

In the concrete ruins of Pokrovsk, Russian command committed an unforgivable military sin:
Grinding its elite VDV airborne units into disposable trench fodder.
Ukraine turned the sector into an inescapable trap, trading meters of ruined asphalt to permanently dismantle Russia’s operational force.
The slow Russian progress in the Pokrovsk sector was touted as another example of the Russian steamroller.
And finally, Russia did conquer Pokrovsk.
However, winning the city and then turning that success into an operational advantage are two different things.
By 2026, when it came to the broader battlefield around Pokrovsk, the area was still absorbing Russian forces, drones, artillery and some of Moscow’s best units. But the battle did not turn into an easy breakthrough against the Ukrainians farther west.
The real “trap” of Pokrovsk was never a dramatic physical encirclement. It was the possibility that Russia would spend an extraordinary amount of combat power taking the city, only to discover that the battlefield beyond it remained just as difficult.
Open-source assessments underline the problem. The Institute for the Study of War assessed in February 2026 that Russian forces had seized Pokrovsk but had failed to turn the capture into operationally significant advances.
The fighting was hardly over.
On August 7, Ukraine’s General Staff reported 192 combat incidents throughout the entire frontline, with the Pokrovsk sector having the most Russian attacks on the day. On 12 August, 237 clashes were reported in the front area, some of which were again in the vicinity of Pokrovsk and Kostiantynivka.
Pokrovsk had fallen.
The battle for what came after Pokrovsk had not.
Despite the capture of the city, Russian troops persisted in what amounted to fairly modest gains around the perimeter. In July 2026, Russian forces made advances in the broader operational area, but ISW determined that the pace of progress was too slow for Russia to achieve its far more expansive goals in Donetsk Oblast. In the first half of August, Russian troops continued the assault on Pokrovsk with no breakthroughs made on several days.
The continued presence of Russia’s airborne forces makes that cost especially important.
The Vozdushno-desantnye voyska, better known as the VDV, were built as some of Russia’s highest-readiness forces. Their historical purpose emphasized rapid deployment, airborne and air-assault operations, seizure of critical objectives, and aggressive maneuver.
The war in Ukraine has forced them into a very different role.
Elements of the 76th Guards Air Assault Division were reported participating in operations connected to Pokrovsk from at least late 2025. In March 2026, Ukrainian military reporting identified a deployment point reportedly used by the 76th Division near the sector. By August, the division remained important enough that the Kremlin publicly highlighted its role in operations around Pokrovsk and Dobropillya.
Instead, the lower airspace over the battlefield became saturated with reconnaissance drones, FPV strike drones, electronic warfare, interceptor systems, and increasingly sophisticated counter-drone operations.
That environment makes large troop concentrations and conventional armored movement exceptionally dangerous.
RUSI has described the wider war as one in which millions of FPV drones and large numbers of one-way attack systems have fundamentally changed battlefield conditions. Drone observation makes concealment harder, while strike drones dramatically shorten the distance between detection and attack.
The result around Pokrovsk was a battlefield where even small movements could be detected and punished.
Ukraine’s own 7th Air Assault Corps repeatedly reported identifying Russian troop concentrations, drone positions, and command facilities inside and around the city.
The battle did not end when Russian infantry entered the buildings.
The buildings simply became part of the targeting cycle.
In June 2026, Ukraine’s 7th Air Assault Corps said Russian troops had been concentrating personnel inside a panel apartment building in Pokrovsk. Ukrainian forces struck the location, killing roughly ten Russian soldiers according to the corps, while others were reportedly trapped beneath collapsed concrete.
The same Ukrainian formation reported Russian forces using basements, entrances, and concrete shelters inside Pokrovsk to establish drone launch and control positions. One such facility in the city center was subsequently struck by Ukrainian forces.
Veteran non-commissioned officers, competent platoon and company commanders, experienced drone crews, communications specialists, reconnaissance personnel, and trained assault troops accumulate knowledge that cannot simply be manufactured by increasing recruitment bonuses.
Russia has repeatedly demonstrated that it can absorb enormous losses and continue fighting. That should not be underestimated. RUSI’s analysis of Russian adaptation in 2026 describes a military model built heavily around endurance, mass, and the willingness to sustain losses over time.
But the ability to absorb losses does not make those losses strategically irrelevant.
Every experienced airborne soldier committed to another infantry assault is a soldier unavailable for another mission.
Months after the city fell, Russian troops were still fighting through the surrounding sector. The long-awaited operational collapse had not followed. Ukrainian forces continued contesting approaches, attacking concentrations, disrupting drone infrastructure, and forcing Moscow to commit substantial combat power to keep pushing forward.
Russia can point to Pokrovsk on the map and call it a victory.
But maps record territory.
And they do not show how much combat power must still be spent trying to turn a captured city into an actual breakthrough.
That may ultimately be the real trap of Pokrovsk.

AI's next Big Leap Is Into Real World Robotics

2026-08-22T08:49:47.487-04:00

The goal is not superintelligence or other cult-like musings, but training for practical applications that can actually produce and operate in real world settings in order to improve performance.

Considered low-brow by some, many investors see this as the gateway to operating efficiencies and, ultimately, the real pay-off for AI. JL

Christopher Mims reports in the Wall Street Journal:

AI models are being trained on videogames and simulations, rather than literature, code and images. They have reached a point where they can navigate in three-dimensional space and even manipulate objects autonomously with just a set of instructions. World-model startups want to create a control system that’s as versatile when piloting robots as today’s LLMs are when crafting text, from sonnets to software. The bet is a model can pilot a robot in the real world as if it were a character in a videogame. One caveat: It has to send a live video feed to a user, and can be controlled with a videogame controller, or mouse and keyboard. This is typical criteria for mainstream robots, but it excludes most two-legged humanoid robots.

Today’s AI large language models might excel at pushing a pencil around, but proponents say doing real physical work requires large action models, aka world models.
In this approach intended for piloting robots, artificial-intelligence models are trained on videogames and simulations, rather than literature, code and images. They have recently reached a point where, in some circumstances, they can navigate in three-dimensional space and even manipulate objects autonomously with just a simple set of instructions.
It’s still early days for this tech, says Moritz Baier-Lentz, an investor in several companies in this area. “If we’re comparing this to large language models, this is like GPT-2,” he adds. (That’s the model OpenAI released way back in 2019.)
Despite the relatively primitive state of world models, tech luminaries are piling in. The bet is that a fundamentally new architecture has the potential to take AI to places that today’s LLM-based AIs can’t venture. And one day, pioneers hope to merge these two schools of artificial thought.
From words to worlds
For about half a billion years, animals have been evolving brains capable of modeling the world around them, and using that mental map to plan their next action. Language, on the other hand, dates back only about a hundred millennia, a shorthand humans created to process and relay concepts great and small.
“Text is just a lossy representation of the real world,” says Kent Rollins, chief product officer at General Intuition, and former director of the Fortnite ecosystem at Epic Games. “The world existed long before we had text, and using it to describe the world is going to essentially miss core aspects.”

Roboticists have long known this. The control systems of today’s more sophisticated robots rely on physics-based simulations of the physical realm. These, too, are world models, though they are painstakingly coded and highly specialized. What works for one kind of robot doesn’t work on another.
Today’s world-model startups want to create a control system that’s as versatile when piloting robots as today’s LLMs are when crafting text, from sonnets to software.
New York-based world-model startup General Intuition is now finalizing a round of investment that would value it at more than $6 billion, making it the most valuable AI lab of this kind. The basis of its training is videogames: The company’s model captures every frame of a game, as well as the actions users take—every press on a button or nudge of a control stick. Unlike robots trained on video alone, this allows its AI to connect user actions to their consequences in virtual worlds, yielding a large action model.

With a little fine-tuning, a model can pilot a robot in the real world as if it were a character in a videogame. One caveat: It has to be a quadruped, wheeled vehicle or flying drone that would normally send a live video feed to a user, and can be controlled with a videogame controller, or mouse and keyboard. This is fairly typical criteria for many mainstream robots, but it excludes most two-legged humanoid robots.
General Intuition’s model is trained on millions of hours of videogame play from real humans, gathered from its sister service Medal.tv, a platform for capturing and sharing gaming clips.

In and around their offices in New York and Geneva, General Intuition shows off a robot dog. While a typical AI for driving such a robot might require enormous amounts of training, this one just requires a few minutes of fine-tuning. The system needs to know where it is, what kind of body it’s in and what its goal is—then away it goes, says Baier-Lentz, who is an investor in General Intuition.
Previous demos of world models, like the Genie models unveiled by Google DeepMind, focused on generating new worlds to train robots. This next generation perceives the world and decides what to do next. Jack Parker-Holder, who previously led those world-model efforts at Google, co-founded London-based Emulate. The fledgling lab is in talks to raise more than $500 million from investors, and its tech talent includes a half-dozen other former Googlers, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
Language + action = ?
Other world-model companies are reluctant to share details about the AIs they are building, but their acquisitions and the publications of their engineers give some hints.

World Labs, the startup headed by Stanford professor and Google veteran—and “godmother of AI”—Fei-Fei Li, recently acquired robotics company Scenix. AMI Labs, headed by Meta’s former chief AI scientist Yann LeCun, appears to be working on something broader, exploring multiple architectures outside of traditional large language models. (Both companies declined to comment for this article.)
While General Intuition and other startups emphasize their capabilities in robotics, potential investors and business partners are asking another question: How can world models enhance the abilities of today’s language-based models?
The team at General Intuition’s offices in Geneva, from left: Adam Jelley, CEO Pim de Witte, Vincent Micheli and James Swingos.
For LLMs to process images and audio, they have to be trained on that media directly, turning the inputs into tokens as they do with words. Trying to process a three-dimensional scene in this way has proven to be massively inefficient, yielding models that are too slow to direct a robot in most situations.
But world models come with their own set of issues: It was relatively easy to evolve ChatGPT from one generation to the next precisely because it started out only playing with text. As LLMs grow, and are crammed with more and more data, they get bigger and smarter, but they continue to make mistakes, says George Konidaris, a professor of robotics at Brown University, and a co-founder of Realtime Robotics, which builds systems for industrial robots.
With robots, there are far fewer scenarios where we would accept hallucinations and other oopsies.

“The real world is very complex, and has a lot of special cases and hard edges, and you can’t approximately miss something,” says Konidaris. “If you hit something while moving your robot, everything changes.”
While some think increasing efficiencies in LLMs might make them enough to become the AI that powers robotics and other 3-D applications, a hybrid concept also exists: LLMs could call on world models, the way they call on other software to help them do their jobs.
In the meantime, both General Intuition and Emulate are conspicuously not based in the Bay Area, which has become enthralled by the potential of LLM-based AIs to lead to “superintelligence.”
When I ask if superintelligence is the goal of his company, General Intuition’s CEO, Pim de Witte, demurs, “I’m in New York because I want to stay away from all the cult-like behavior, and just focus on scientifically evaluating capabilities of models in robots,” he says. “We don’t need to make it more than what it is.”

China Wouldn't Sell Ukraine A Strike Drone - So Kyiv Stole the Blueprints

2026-08-21T10:08:36.519-04:00

Whatever it takes. JL

Wes O'Donnell reports in Medium:

On July 16, Ukrainian drones traveled 800 kilometers inside Russia and reached Engels-2 air base, one of the country’s most important strategic bomber facilities. Satellite imagery showed a Tu-95MS strategic bomber with its tail section completely torn away. n the summer of 2023, China tightened its export controls on civilian drones. The Ukrainians accepted an offer for pilot training instead and used their time on the factory floor to quietly document everything they could see. “In parallel with the training, we photographed everything that was there,”. They flew home with eight actual drones and a phone full of pictures of the Chinese production line. China wouldn’t sell them the recipe, so the Ukrainians spent their training time photographing every shelf and cabinet in the kitchen. Once home, Ukraine took the eight aircraft apart and started building its own version. It's now building and firing 6,000 a year
On July 16, Ukrainian drones traveled roughly 800 kilometers inside Russia and reached Engels-2 air base, one of the country’s most important strategic bomber facilities.
Satellite imagery from Planet Labs, examined by the open-source group AviVector, later showed a Tu-95MS strategic bomber with its tail section completely torn away, sitting beside an intact sister aircraft, the kind of clean before-and-after comparison that leaves very little room for argument.
Russia stopped building Tu-95s in 1992. Every one that burns is permanently gone, and Russia’s fleet may now be down to somewhere around 43 airframes, with only about a dozen usually active on any given day.
For three and a half weeks, nobody publicly said what actually hit it.
Now we know.
On August 12, the Ukrainian defense outlet Oboronka published a report, cleared in advance with both the manufacturer and the SBU, identifying the weapon as the MICH 2000, a previously secret black flying-wing attack drone used exclusively by the SBU’s Alpha special operations unit.
Now, for US veterans of the Global War on Terror, the name “MICH 2000” makes us do a double-take. That happens to be the name of the Modular Integrated Communications Helmet (MICH) with “2000” being the first year it was developed.
I can’t find any public reporting to describe what the Ukrainian MICH is named after or whether it’s an acronym for something else.
Press enter or click to view image in full size
The MICH 2000 helmet. DoD
According to that manufacturer’s own account, the aircraft can fly up to 2,000 kilometers, carry a warhead between 25 and 60 kilograms, costs about $48,000 in its base configuration, and rolls off a Ukrainian production line at a rate of roughly 6,000 units a year.
Here’s the story of how they made it…
Back in 2022 and 2023, Ukraine was still scrambling to build a serious domestic deep-strike industry from close to nothing. Ukrainian units had been buying Chinese Mugin-5 PRO civilian drones and converting them into one-way attack aircraft, running around $15,000 apiece, carrying about 25 kilograms, and reaching roughly 500 kilometers.
That was a decent capability, although 25 kilograms is a little on the smaller side for explosives on a deep strike platform.
Then, in the summer of 2023, China tightened its export controls on civilian drones.
Beijing said publicly the restrictions weren’t aimed at any particular country. (Sure, wink wink. Yet they kept exporting junk to Russia during this timeframe.)
Whatever the reason, Ukraine needed another source, and late that year a team of Ukrainian engineers flew to China hoping to buy finished aircraft directly from a manufacturer in-country.
They found a factory near Hong Kong, run by a company called ZTK Drones, building dozens of ZTK-150s; Shahed-shaped flying wings distinguished by a pair of small forward canards.
They tried to buy in bulk. The purchase stalled.
Then the company offered to sell the blueprints.
“They came up with the idea to sell us the technology so we could make everything ourselves,” one team member said. “That’s when they planted the idea that we could really build drones in Ukraine instead of buying and shipping them.”
Ukraine’s military leadership loved it. When the team flew back to China ready to close the deal, the factory’s own management refused to authorize the sale, and the whole thing looked dead.
Then things got wonderfully strange.
The Ukrainians accepted an offer for pilot training instead and used their time on the factory floor to quietly document everything they could see.
“In parallel with the training, we photographed everything that was there,” one unnamed team member later told Oboronka. They flew home with eight actual drones and a phone full of pictures of the Chinese production line.
China wouldn’t sell them the recipe, so the Ukrainians spent their training time photographing every shelf and cabinet in the kitchen.
Once home, Ukraine took the eight aircraft apart and started building its own version.

Anyways, back to the MICH 2000. It didn’t go well at first.
The first Ukrainian-built prototype flew about one kilometer before crashing, thanks to an off-balance center of gravity.
The second held together for roughly an hour before engine vibration sheared the bolts holding its propeller in place.
The third encountered Russian electronic warfare during testing and lost its control link entirely, proving the original Chinese architecture was never going to survive the electromagnetic soup.
Once Ukraine started producing its own fuselages instead of relying on the Chinese airframes, the crashes kept coming, but were getting fewer and farther between. The Ukrainian manufacturer told Ukrainska Pravda that for roughly six to eight weeks they simply kept destroying test drones while grinding through aerodynamic and structural problems one at a time.
Judge that record by any normal peacetime procurement standard and the obvious conclusion is that the aircraft wasn’t ready. Alpha reached a different conclusion entirely.
Alpha sent it to war before the engineers thought it was ready
According to the manufacturer’s account, Alpha eventually told the company that range testing had gone on long enough. The engineers protested that the aircraft still wasn’t flying properly but Alpha wanted combat results instead of more test data.
The first operational mission flew in October 2024.
Three drones launched.
One got shot down. The other two reached the target area and missed their assigned aim points by roughly ten meters.
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SBU and Oboronka
SBU Alpha approved production anyway…
By any traditional acquisition logic, that first mission reads as a clean failure, a one-for-three combat record with the two survivors both missing the target.
SBU Alpha apparently read the same mission and saw something different: The aircraft launched successfully, it navigated a real combat route through contested airspace, and two out of three penetrated far enough to reach their targets.
What remained broken was accuracy, and accuracy is an engineering problem you can solve, not a fundamental flaw you have to scrap the program over.
They didn’t need a perfect weapon that day. They needed a weapon that was good enough to survive long enough to enter the iteration cycle, and it barely, technically qualified.
Plenty of acquisition organizations would have shelved a weapon after a mission like that. Alpha apparently saw a prototype that had just delivered a very expensive set of test results under the only conditions that were ever going to matter.
The Modern War Institute at West Point has documented this exact pattern across Ukraine’s drone industry more broadly.
Ukrainian manufacturers commonly revise their hardware and software three or four times a year, with frontline combat units increasingly picking their own equipment and feeding performance data straight back to the people building it, no committee required.
Compare that to how major American acquisition programs have traditionally run, often stretching toward twelve years from concept to fielded weapon, with even the deliberately expedited pathways still measured in years rather than months.
Here’s the technical payoff: The manufacturer says almost nothing survives from the original Chinese ZTK-150 beyond its general outer shape.
MICH has grown into a family of eight distinct configurations rather than one fixed aircraft, with customers, (meaning Alpha), reportedly able to select different warheads, fuel arrangements, terminal guidance packages, and analog, digital, or Starlink communications links depending on the mission.
A MICH 2000 spotted in Russia. SBU.
Maximum reported range tops out around 2,000 kilometers, and the warhead swings anywhere from roughly 25 to 60 kilograms.
Not every target needs maximum range though. A mission 400 kilometers out can trade some of that fuel weight for a bigger warhead instead.
A route running through heavy jamming can justify spending money on better navigation gear.
Another target might need dedicated terminal guidance to hit precisely rather than approximately.
Six thousand a year
The unnamed manufacturer reports current production running around 6,000 aircraft a year, with an internal goal of pushing that toward 10,000, and says it’s reinvesting roughly $1 million a month back into research and development.
Worth a real qualifier here. MICH 2000 has exactly one customer, the SBU’s Alpha unit, so it isn’t fair to hold its 6,000-a-year figure up against something like Fire Point’s much larger FP-1 program as though the two are directly competing for the same contract.
FP-1 serves a considerably broader customer base across the whole military. What’s striking about MICH is narrower and, in its own way, more interesting.
A single Ukrainian special-operations organization apparently generated enough sustained internal demand to keep an industrial production line running in the thousands per year, which is a wildly different scale of ambition than what most people picture when they hear the phrase “special operations equipment.”
Back to Engels-2. The manufacturer attributes a whole list of MICH missions to targets including Ust-Luga port, Moscow-area industrial sites, a Wildberries logistics hub in Ryazan Oblast, an electronic-warfare system near Gelendzhik used to jam Starlink, and now Engels-2, along with strikes inside occupied Ukrainian territory.
Ukrainska Pravda’s own reporters independently reviewed dozens of videos of Shahed-shaped drones striking Russian targets and confirmed at least eight showing what they identified as MICH aircraft specifically.
The economics involved are remarkable.
A drone that costs roughly $48,000 in its basic configuration, built by a country under active invasion, potentially took a permanent bite out of a strategic bomber fleet that stopped being manufactured in 1992 and simply cannot be replaced.
Ukraine is trading something engineered to be manufactured by the thousands and destroyed on its very first successful mission against an aircraft Russia inherited whole from the Soviet Union and can never make more of. Chef’s kiss.
MICH+ proves maximum range was never really the point
The successor design, MICH+, reportedly cuts maximum range almost in half, down from 2,000 kilometers to around 600. On its face, that looks like a downgrade for a company that’s spent two years bragging about reach.
It isn’t, once you see what Ukraine traded for it. The shorter-range version reportedly increases the warhead to around 70 kilograms, adds real terminal guidance, drops the ZTK-150’s original forward canards entirely, and lands at a lower target price near $40,000.
That tells you the company was never chasing a single record-distance wonder weapon; it’s building a family of tools instead.
A 2,000-kilometer mission deep into Siberia has a completely different set of requirements than hitting a hardened facility sitting 500 kilometers behind the front line.
Fuel is payload you’re spending.
Range is payload you’re spending.
Guidance costs real money on top of both.
The useful weapon, in the end, is whichever configuration actually fits the specific target in front of you.

Ukraine's Plan To Shut Down Moscow's Airports With AI Drone Swarms

2026-08-21T09:10:12.307-04:00

It hasn't happened yet, but appears feasible. It is presumably being refined and held in reserve for the most opportune impact. JL

Simon Shuster reports in The Atlantic:

Ukrainian officials want to launch waves of AI-enabled drones at Moscow’s airports, hoping to stop international carriers from flying in and out of the Russian capital. Ukraine would warn civilian airlines to avoid Russian airports and evacuate their planes before the swarm of Ukrainian drones arrived. “If they say to themselves, You know what, it’s getting too risky. Why even continue flying there?” the source said. “That would already have quite an impact on the Russian elites. Those are their main connections to the outside world." world.” Airports across the country were forced to close 114 times from June 28 to July 28, usually due to the threat of Ukrainian drones. Moscow was affected by the highest number of shutdowns—17 in total at its four main airports. The Russian association of travel agents reported more than 290 of these incidents nationwide in the first quarter of this year.

Early this year, Ukrainian officials came to President Volodymyr Zelensky with a risky new plan to end the war with Russia. It would require expanding their bombing campaign to include a set of targets and a class of weapons they had long avoided. In addition to Ukraine’s ongoing strikes against Russian military bases, oil refineries, supply lines, and logistics hubs, the officials wanted to launch waves of AI-enabled drones at Moscow’s airports, hoping to stop international carriers from flying in and out of the Russian capital, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the plan, which has not been previously reported.

Both people spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe sensitive military operations. If executed, the plan would mark a terrifying milestone in the history of warfare: an attack in which swarms of autonomous drones equipped with AI guidance systems would seek out and hit their targets without a human pilot controlling their movements. Such systems have been tested by various countries in recent years, including the United States. But the legality of their use has been vigorously debated as a possible violation of the laws of war, and they have never been deployed at scale.
When officials presented the plan to Zelensky this winter, he expressed strong reservations, one of the sources said. He worried that it could be seen as “piracy” if the drones hit a civilian airliner in Moscow, especially if the strikes killed or injured passengers, airport staff, or members of the flight crew. But in his desperation to find a Russian pressure point that could restart the peace process, Zelensky allowed preparations for the strikes to continue for several months this spring and early summer, both sources said.
A spokesperson for Zelensky declined to comment. Another official in the president’s office denied the existence of a plan to launch swarms of AI-enabled drones at Moscow’s airports. “That’s total nonsense,” the official told me, asking not to be named in an article about this topic. Ukraine has long sought to force the closure of Russian airports, the official added, and its drone strikes against various targets in Russia have often achieved that goal for short periods of time. But Ukraine does not have long-range weapons that are precise and reliable enough to hit Russian airports without posing an undue risk to civilians, the official said.

According to Russian aviation authorities, airports across the country were forced to close 114 times during a one-month period last summer, from June 28 to July 28, usually due to the threat of Ukrainian drones. Moscow was affected by the highest number of shutdowns—at least 17 in total at its four main airports. The Russian association of travel agents reported more than 290 of these incidents nationwide in the first quarter of this year. The airport closures, which Russians refer to as a kovyor, meaning “carpet,” usually last a few hours before authorities give the all-clear and allow flights to resume. “We’ve only ever had one operation against the airports,” the official said. “Force the Russians to declare ‘carpets’ all the time.”
By the middle of spring, the plan to force a more permanent shutdown of Moscow’s airports had advanced far enough to receive a code name: M&Ms, a reference to the many small, cheap, and nearly identical drones that the mission would require. To overwhelm Russian air defenses, the operation would need to send as many as 1,000 drones a night to airports in and around Moscow, said one of the sources familiar with it. Attacks of that size would not be far outside the norm in this conflict. Earlier this week, Russian authorities reported shooting down 791 Ukrainian drones in a single night, one of the largest attacks of the war; more than 600 of them were flying toward the Moscow region, according to the city’s mayor.
“The idea is to shut down the Moscow airspace to civilian flights for an extended period of time,” one of the sources familiar with the plan told me. Since the start of the Russian invasion, in February 2022, civilian air travel over Ukraine has been suspended. But Russian airports have mostly remained open, and millions of passengers used them this year to travel abroad. Due to Western sanctions, only a few international carriers still fly in and out of Moscow, including Turkish Airlines and Emirates, which many well-to-do Russians use to reach hubs in Istanbul and Dubai.
Forcing those carriers to stop flying to Russia would make life less comfortable for officials, oligarchs, and other wealthy loyalists of President Vladimir Putin. “People in the elites might come to Putin and say: We have a problem here,” said one of the sources familiar with the Ukrainian plan. That kind of pressure from the elites, in combination with other wartime strains on Russia’s economy and society, could force Putin to negotiate a peace deal, the source said.
Both sources told me planning for the operation was halted in July, when Zelensky abruptly fired its mastermind, Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov. As the architect of Ukraine’s military drone program, Fedorov had worked on the plan for most of this year, keeping it a secret even from some of his closest aides. He helped assemble a team of Ukrainian computer programmers to develop the AI guidance system, and he secured financing from Ukraine’s allies in Europe to produce the autonomous drones at scale, the two sources said.

Having served throughout the war as a crucial member of Zelensky’s team, Fedorov changed this month into a potential rival for the presidency. In a video address posted on YouTube yesterday, the former defense minister called for Ukraine to hold elections and choose a new government. Ukraine has not held presidential or parliamentary elections since 2019, because Ukrainian martial law, which has been in effect since the start of the invasion, prohibits elections in a time of war. Opinion polls taken in recent weeks show that Fedorov has grown popular enough in Ukraine since his dismissal to pose a serious challenge to Zelensky in a presidential race. “Democracy cannot be held hostage by Russia,” Fedorov said in his speech.
The same day, the Ukrainian Parliament confirmed the nomination of a new defense minister, Yevhenii Khmara, a decorated military veteran. The vote in Parliament foreclosed Fedorov’s hopes of returning to his previous post anytime soon. It also threw into doubt the future of the operation known as M&Ms. One of the sources familiar with the plan expressed hope that the new defense minister would carry it forward. “We will try. Technically it’s possible,” the source said. “You can revive this project with a new team, but it would take, in my view, around three months.” By that time, another brutal winter of war will have arrived.
In the months before his dismissal, Fedorov pursued numerous high-tech plans to force the Russians to negotiate before the onset of winter. The Atlantic reported earlier this month that he had appealed for help from Elon Musk, and that Zelensky had asked President Trump to secure Musk’s assistance. The Ukrainians needed Musk to allow the use of Starlink, his satellite-communications network, as a navigation tool for drones to hit targets inside Russia, including Russian ballistic-missile launchers, with precision. Musk has refused to allow the use of Starlink over Russian territory. He has not replied to my messages seeking comment on the matter.

As an alternative to Starlink, the Ukrainians have rushed to develop reliable drones equipped with AI, which offer a way to get around Russia’s counter-drone defenses. Most attack drones require a pilot to guide them to their targets, through radio signals, mobile internet connections, or some other means of remote control. Russia, like most advanced military powers, uses electronic jamming to disrupt the signal between enemy drones and their pilots, forcing the weapons to crash or veer off course.
Last summer, the Ukrainians found an ingenious way around this problem. They hid 117 drones inside five long-haul trucks and hired unwitting drivers to bring them close to Russian air bases. Once in position, the drones connected to the internet, reportedly using Russian SIM cards, and flew out of the trucks’ secret compartments. Drone pilots back in Ukraine used the internet connection to guide most of the weapons to their targets. The mission, known as Operation Spider’s Web, damaged or destroyed roughly two dozen Russian warplanes, including nuclear-capable bombers, that stood parked on the tarmac of their bases in Russia.
Ukraine’s latest plan would allow the drones to pilot themselves, using an AI-powered technique known as map matching, the two sources familiar with the plan told me. The technique involves uploading detailed maps of a drone’s intended flight path to its onboard computer, along with pictures of its targets. As the drone flies, its camera collects images of the terrain below. The onboard computer uses an AI model to compare those images with the ones stored in its memory, a bit like a person consulting a map on an unfamiliar highway. When the camera spots something that matches, or resembles, the image of the target, the drone flies into it and explodes. A human pilot does not need to confirm that the drone has found the right target before it strikes.

When this technology first appeared in Ukraine a couple of years ago, some drone manufacturers told me, they had declined to make it available to their clients in the military, because they found it too risky. One drone maker showed me an AI-targeting system with a kind of accuracy selector, which he could slide up and down on a screen. If he chose the lower setting, it would give the drone permission to attack even if its AI model is only 30 percent certain that it sees the right target. The highest setting tells the AI to reach 90 percent certainty before it decides to strike. Even that did not seem precise enough for the manufacturer, who wondered what would happen if a child on a bicycle were to enter the frame of the drone’s camera as it locked onto its target: “Who is responsible if that kid dies?”
Ukrainian officials, arms makers, and military officers have wrestled with such questions for years. Some have called for the Ukrainian Parliament or an international body such as the United Nations to develop guidelines for the use of AI targeting in warfare. No such rules exist in Ukrainian law. The U.S. and most of its allies have vague guidelines about a human needing to be “in the loop” before an AI model decides to attack. But most experts on the laws of war see such restrictions as outdated and insufficient.
Zelensky raised concerns about unintended targets being struck when it came to the plan to attack Moscow’s airports, one of the sources familiar with these conversations told me. The officials behind the plan offered work-arounds, the source said. They suggested, for example, that Ukraine would warn civilian airlines to avoid Russian airports and evacuate their planes before the swarm of Ukrainian drones arrived. “If they say to themselves, You know what, it’s getting too risky. Why even continue flying there?” the source said. “That would already have quite an impact on the Russian elites. Those are their main connections to the outside world.”

As Russian Losses Rise, Ukraine Is Increasing Putin's "Strategic Pain"

2026-08-21T08:56:01.198-04:00

The Ukrainians are sensing that Putin is feeling increased strategic pain, both economically and militarily. They are determined to enhance that level of discomfort as much as they can not so much that Putin will do anything new as his survival is now tied to continuing the war but so that the intended target of the pain is the oligarch class and the mass of Russians who will go along until they sense vulnerability in the Kremlin. JL

Mick Ryan reports in the Lowy Institute:

The Russians suffered 43,000 casualties in July, the highest since January. This is a major increase on the average of 30,000 Russian casualties per month over the last year. The southern offensive appears to have had a dual focus of liberating territory and causing as much destruction to Russian ground forces as possible. The Ukrainians need to increase the strategic pain felt by Putin, and they might do this by mounting more offensive campaigns to take back significant amounts of Ukrainian territory over the next year. This might form part of a one-two punch (in combination with mid and long-range strikes) against Putin.
The most recent chart prepared by Russia Matters, which shows Russian gains and losses since May 2022, is below. It is unclear whether this includes the territory that Ukraine has liberated in its southern offensive operations this year.
Image: Russia Matters
Related to this has been increased Russian casualties in July. The Ukrainian Ministry of Defence estimated that the Russians had suffered almost 43,000 casualties that month, one of the highest monthly totals of the war and the highest since January. This does not yet meet the requirement of 50,000 Russian casualties set by the Ukrainian president at the beginning of this year but is a major increase on the average of 30,000 Russian casualties per month over the last year. The southern offensive appears to have had a dual focus of liberating territory and causing as much destruction to Russian ground forces as possible.
This was certainly assisted by the multi-month-long mid-range strike campaign that has been undertaken by the Ukrainian Unmanned Systems Forces. This operational interdiction campaign has destroyed Russian tactical and operational logistics, which has limited support to both frontline and reserve Russian ground force units.
The real question about this southern offensive is whether it was designed from the start as a test of new Ukrainian ground offensive techniques or whether it began as a series of local attacks exploiting Russian weaknesses and then evolved into the broader campaign that President Zelenskyy described this week. It is fair to assess that it might well be a combination of both.
This is relevant because the Ukrainians have demonstrated throughout this war the desire and the willingness to trial evolved forms of combined arms tactics that exploit aerial and ground drone technology to dominate the tactical reconnaissance battle, to exploit the impact of Ukrainian artillery when it breaks up concentrations of Russian troops, to create the space for ground maneuver using mounted and dismounted combat troops, and to provide an array of support functions such as EW, resupply, point defence, casualty evacuation, mine emplacement and clearance and psychological operations against the Russians.
At the same time, the Ukrainians have embraced the old art of deception more and more as the war has progressed. This was a crucial enabler before the 2022 Kherson and Kharkiv offensives and before the 2024 Kursk operation and is likely to have played an important role during the southern offensive operations conducted over the past seven months or so.
What the Ukrainians are demonstrating here is a willingness to try new ideas on a battlefield which has become more visible (but not transparent) against a larger, adaptive adversary. At the surface level, the purpose is to be able to defend their territory and liberate lands occupied by the Russians. But more fundamentally, Ukraine needs to develop more effective military tools to hurt Russia even more on the ground. While it is stepping up the number of casualties it causes among the Russians each month, it needs to continue to increase Russia’s monthly casualties to 50,000 each month and perhaps even higher than this to fend off the insertion of more troops if Russia mobilises next month.
More importantly, despite the impact of the long-range strikes inside Russia over the past year against energy, defence factories, air defence systems and dual use logistics hubs like the Wildberries warehouses, Putin has not yet demonstrated any willingness to compromise on his maximalist objectives for his war against Ukraine.
Therefore, the Ukrainians need to increase the strategic pain felt by Putin, and they might potentially do this by mounting more offensive campaigns – undertaken by one of more Corps – to take back significant amounts of Ukrainian territory over the next year. This might form part of a one-two punch (in combination with mid and long-range strikes) against Putin. Not only might it change Putin’s strategic calculus, it would probably shift further the willingness of the Trump regime to support (but still not embrace) the Ukrainians as “the side that is winning the war”.

Russian Collapse at Dnipropetrovsk Due To Lack of Reinforcements

2026-08-21T08:41:46.975-04:00

Relentless Ukrainian pressure has driven Russian forces from Dnipropetrovsk as the Kremlin was unable to provide reinforcements to its troops there.

The Ukrainian strategy appears to be to undermine the Russian concentration on Donbas by attacking other sectors where Russian defenses are weaker, thereby threatening the entire front so that the Kremlin must rush troops from place to place to address each crisis. JL

RFU News reports:

Russian forces have retreated from the last section of the Dnipropetrovsk region that they had managed to take under their control. The fact that even typically pro-war Russian sources are admitting this is particularly revealing. Rather than blaming overwhelming Ukrainian superiority alone, several Russian analysts angrily point to failures within Russia’s own command structure, which failed to provide the reserves that could have stabilized the sector, leaving the Russian group of forces East without enough manpower to hold its positions. The withdrawal comes after weeks of relentless Ukrainian pressure.
Russian military analysts officially confirmed that Russian forces have retreated from the last section of the Dnipropetrovsk region that they had managed to take under their control. The fact that even typically pro-war Russian sources are admitting this is particularly revealing. Rather than blaming overwhelming Ukrainian superiority alone, several Russian analysts angrily point to failures within Russia’s own command structure, which failed to provide the reserves that could have stabilized the sector, leaving the Russian group of forces East without enough manpower to hold its positions. The criticism extends beyond battlefield conditions to the General Staff itself, with open accusations about poor force allocation, systematic planning failures, and the inability to transition from offensive operations to an organized defense.
The withdrawal comes after weeks of relentless Ukrainian pressure in what became one of the most difficult sectors for Russian troops. The Seventy-Ninth Air Assault Brigade released footage showing enemy infiltration groups from the Russian Ninetieth Tank Division being detected almost immediately after moving forward and then systematically eliminated with FPV drones, bomber drones, artillery, and follow-up clearing operations by Ukrainian special forces operators. This is only one example of what has happened along the entire line, with full Russian battalions suffering devastating losses attempting to maintain positions under constant aerial surveillance until being completely eliminated. Instead of establishing stable defensive lines, many units were reduced to rotating small infantry groups into exposed positions where they were hunted continuously. The cumulative attrition eventually made holding the remaining foothold increasingly difficult, even before the shortage of reinforcements became critical.
The main reason reinforcements never arrived appears to be Russia's strategic prioritization of Donbas. Capturing the remaining Ukrainian-held territory in the Donetsk Region remains Vladimir Putin's primary military objective, and available reserves continue flowing toward that part of the front line instead of secondary sectors. This leaves commanders elsewhere, like in Dnipropetrovsk, forced to defend with increasingly exhausted formations.
Logistics compounded the problem, as the village of Bahatyr, serving as Russia's main supply hub in the last area under Russian control here, has been heavily devastated after prolonged fighting. Its destruction severely complicates concealment of equipment, ammunition, and troop concentrations. Even if additional reserves had become available, moving and sustaining them through such an exposed logistical node would have been increasingly difficult under persistent Ukrainian reconnaissance and strikes. Faced with mounting losses, insufficient manpower, and deteriorating supply conditions, Russian commanders appear to have concluded that maintaining the remaining positions was no longer practical, so the remaining forces retreated under heavy Ukrainian fire.
This withdrawal also completes a broader Ukrainian effort across the area where the Dnipropetrovsk region borders both the Donetsk and the Zaporizhia regions. During recent weeks, Ukrainian counteroffensive operations steadily liberated settlements and pushed Russian troops back across multiple sectors. The remaining pocket represented the last fragment of Russian control inside the region, but Ukrainian advances gradually compressed this position from several directions until the Russians found themselves defending a salient with shrinking logistical support and no realistic prospect of reinforcement. Instead of launching another costly attempt to stabilize the front, Russian forces ultimately abandoned the area altogether.
Overall, the outcome in the Dnipropetrovsk Region shows how Ukrainian battlefield pressure and wrong Russian priorities can combine to produce operational collapse for the Russians. Ukrainian counteroffensives inflicted the initial setbacks, but the decisive factor was Russia's inability to reinforce the sector after concentrating all available reserves on the Donbas campaign. As Ukrainian attacks continued, Russian commanders found themselves without fresh units to plug the widening gaps. The result was not merely another tactical withdrawal under fire but the complete loss of Russia's remaining foothold in the Dnipropetrovsk Region, achieved through sustained Ukrainian counterattacks and a Russian command structure that effectively sacrificed this sector to sustain another

Anti-Data Center Voter Sentiment Threatens 'Crisis' For AI Growth

2026-08-21T08:24:15.412-04:00

Silicon Valley oversold the 'benefits' of AI to investors in ways that not only exaggerated the potential economic impact, but did so in ways that alienated a growing majority of American voters, who are headed into mid-term elections in just over two months.

Even before the elections, state and local governments are rejecting data center construction permits and some are even passing ordinances prohibiting their construction. The impact of such opposition could stall the building of the centers the tech industry claims it has to have to meet growth targets which were already fanciful. A cascading effect would then take place due to the amount of debt issued by tech companies which they may then be unable to pay off. Without the expected computing capacity, stalled due to local opposition across the US, AI projections appear even further out of reach and the industry only recently has begun to wake up to the seriousness of the threat, but has not yet proven able to cogently address voters' concerns, in large measure because it never occurred to them that they might be held accountable for the financial, environmental and social affect as well as the fact that a significant majority of Americans believe AI will enrich billionaires while impoverishing everyone else. That is not a winning platform for Big Tech. JL

Amrith Ramkumar and Sabrina Rodriguez report in the Wall Street Journal:

A growing voter outcry over data centers that strain resources and fuel a technology capable of putting Americans out of work is becoming a mounting liability for Republicans and some Democrats in this fall’s elections. More than 60% of Americans now oppose new data centers in their area, up from 49% in March. The backlash is a crisis for AI companies, which are facing bans or pauses on new projects in dozens of states and localities. They pose a risk to investors heading into the 2028 presidential election due to the volume of such proposals. The opposition has the potential to slash 2% to 3% off annual economic growth if it metastasizes.

In November, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott declared his state the “epicenter of AI development” while announcing a $40 billion investment by Google.
Less than a year later, the Republican said he halted approvals of some 1,800 new data centers worth billions of dollars on concerns that they use too much power and water. The move earlier this month drew the ire of President Trump, who this week staunchly defended the centers as an economic engine.
A growing voter outcry over data centers that strain resources and fuel a technology capable of putting Americans out of work is becoming a mounting liability for Republicans and some Democrats in this fall’s elections. Abbott’s opponent in his bid for a fourth term, Democrat Gina Hinojosa, has hammered him on the issue while climbing within a few percentage points in recent polls.
“The data-center issue is the latest example of a governor who has been doing the bidding of moneyed interests instead of the people of Texas,” Hinojosa said in an interview.
Abbott has said companies have agreed to guardrails that minimize disruptions to local water and power markets, showing his plan is working and protecting Texas communities. Hinojosa, a state representative, said protections should be enshrined in law.
She released a new ad Tuesday featuring a person asking a chatbot why their electric bill is going up. The bot responds it is because of data centers approved by Abbott, who has received millions in campaign donations from executives and companies tied to artificial intelligence, including Elon Musk.
Democrats around the country are deploying the same playbook. Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive running for Senate in Michigan, has claimed his opponent, former GOP Rep. Mike Rogers, wants to put the centers in the backyards of voters in the state. “People really effing hate data centers,” he said at a July campaign event.
Rogers said at a Thursday event that there should be a “pause” in the sector. He previously said communities should be able to decide if they want the facilities and should be protected from rising power bills.
In Ohio, Sherrod Brown—the former Democratic senator and his party’s nominee in this year’s Senate contest—is targeting Republican Sen. Jon Husted for championing AI, calling him “the face of data centers” and accusing him of backpedaling on his prior support for them. Husted has said that his stance hasn’t changed and that he always pushed for companies to pay more for power and pay local taxes. He introduced legislation in Congress last month codifying stricter standards for the facilities.
GOP alarm
The committee that works to elect Senate Republicans warned in a Tuesday memo that “data centers are the anchor hanging around Husted’s neck” and that the industry will be blamed if Husted loses because of the issue. The committee said candidates can’t “fix the toxic brand of an entire segment of the economy.”
The warning has put the party at odds with its own president. Trump on Wednesday said he would welcome the centers in his state if he was a mayor or governor because of the economic benefits they present. “If you don’t take it, you’re going to be left behind,” he said.
Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, a critic of government regulation, pledged earlier this month to pause data-center approvals in Ohio until lawmakers pass a bill requiring companies meet environmental standards, ensure locals receive free electricity and pay their full property tax bills.
On Wednesday, Nevada’s Democratic candidate for governor, Aaron Ford, pledged to end tax abatements for new data centers.
More than 60% of Americans now oppose new data centers in their area, up from 49% in March, a University of Pennsylvania poll found.
Activists attended a protest against data centers outside the Texas Capitol in Austin this week. Mikala Compton/Austin American-Statesman/AP
“If you’re a Democrat, we haven’t had a wedge issue like this in decades,” said Brad Carson, a former Democratic congressman representing Oklahoma who is now president of a think tank advocating for stronger AI regulation.
Even Democrats like Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who previously embraced AI, are feeling the pressure. A potential presidential candidate in 2028, Shapiro signed an executive order Tuesday essentially giving the state the power to block the centers.
Last summer, Shapiro praised companies like Amazon.com for building such facilities in the state at a summit attended by Trump and other Republican leaders. Like Abbott, Shapiro is being attacked for his previous stance on AI by his opponent in his re-election campaign.
Other Republicans wielding data centers to attack opponents include Rep. Tom Tiffany, who is running to become governor of Wisconsin and labeled the Milwaukee County executive, David Crowley, as “data center David” in a recent ad after Crowley said last year that the state could become an AI hub. Neither candidate has backed a moratorium like progressive Francesca Hong, who lost to Crowley in the primary last week, and both have supported some restrictions.
‘A powder keg’
The backlash is a crisis for AI companies, which are facing bans or pauses on new projects in dozens of states and localities. They pose a risk to investors heading into the 2028 presidential election due to the volume of such proposals, analysts at investment bank Evercore ISI said in a note to clients.
The opposition has the potential to slash 2% to 3% off annual economic growth if it metastasizes, venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya said on X Thursday. “This is a powder keg,” he wrote.
Industry executives say they will make good on promises to pay more for power and minimize water consumption, but many locals don’t trust the sector.
“We are trying to catch up to this narrative and it continues to grow by leaps and bounds,” said Dan Diorio, executive vice president of state policy and government affairs for the Data Center Coalition, an industry group.
States like Texas had previously welcomed the facilities, which store many types of online data and generate steady streams of tax revenue. Abbott signed legislation more than a decade ago giving data centers tax breaks to attract more technology investment.
ChatGPT’s 2022 launch and the subsequent AI explosion caught states off guard, turbocharging energy and water consumption at facilities that support it. Thanks to its abundant land and energy, as well as friendly permitting, Texas now has more than 500 data centers, second only to Virginia, according to industry tracking platform Data Center Map.
Late last year, Hinojosa saw rural Texans organizing against data centers and began talking about it on the campaign trail. She recently traveled to the Texas Panhandle, a rural part of the state, and heard from frustrated locals.
Abbott’s pause is designed to give regulators time to study the impact of the centers and minimize community disruptions.
“You see the issue about data centers cropping up all over the state, and they were doing so without any sense of regulation,” he told a ballroom of a couple hundred guests at an annual Hidalgo County GOP dinner earlier this month.

To Get Through the Kill Zone, Ground Drones Drive, Soldiers Walk

2026-08-20T07:40:06.574-04:00

Whatever it takes to get to the front. But increasingly, ground drones are the only vehicles that can roll. And men walk. JL

Taiisa Vivdych reports in the Euromaidan Press:

The war has become a contest over who can pull people off the battlefield fastest, as cheap drones make any human movement near the front a target. Ukraine keeps out-inventing Russia at the front, but Russia copies each advance and floods the line with it at state scale. The kill zone—the drone-ruled strip around the contact line—now runs 15 to 20 kilometers deep. Some positions take three days to reach on foot. Where troops once drove most of the way and walked the last stretch, they now walk it all.
Drones have pushed armored vehicles off the roads to Ukraine's front line, a Ukrainian brigade commander told RBC-Ukraine. Denys Perch, who commands the 107th Territorial Defense Brigade, says the drone-saturated belt has grown so deep that pickups no longer reach forward positions. The one enemy weapon his jammers can't touch is the fiber-optic drone.
The war has become a contest over who can pull people off the battlefield fastest, as cheap drones make any human movement near the front a target. Ukraine keeps out-inventing Russia at the front, but Russia copies each advance and floods the line with it at state scale.
When armor becomes the target
Until recently, armored vehicles still drove supplies to logistics hubs near the front. That is now almost impossible. Perch says that when a large, armored machine appears, Russian forces treat it as a prize target and swarm it with dozens of drones and munitions. Perch would sooner park his armor than seat soldiers inside it.

A kill zone that keeps widening
On the busiest sectors, Perch says, the kill zone—the drone-ruled strip around the contact line—now runs 15 to 20 kilometers deep. Some positions take three days to reach on foot. Where troops once drove most of the way and walked the last stretch, they now walk it all.

Under Perch, the brigade climbed, by his account, from around 22nd to third among Ukraine's Territorial Defense forces on the military's strike-results leaderboard, the home-guard units now fighting on the front. Ground robots—unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs)—do the work that armor cannot. They haul supplies and evacuate the wounded, though the robot often can't be brought back. His brigade runs over 1,500 logistics missions a month by heavy bomber drones alone, and still more by first-person-view (FPV) drones and robots. Russia hunts those bombers, he says, with interceptors that scramble the moment they hear one take off, so his crews mix high and low flight to slip past. Perch expects robots to move from supply runs into combat, hitting Russian troops in their rear.

The Strategy Driving Posts of Russians About To Be Killed By Ukraine Drones

2026-08-20T07:33:18.713-04:00

The goal is to show Ukrainians that their military is hitting back hard and to show the Russians that they face a formidable enemy.

Psychological warfare matters, especially as Putin hits more civilian targets with missiles. JL

Luke Harding reports in The Guardian:

To many observers they will appear dehumanising and offensive. To many Ukrainians, however, they are a brutal reminder of the fate that awaits Russian soldiers who take part in Vladimir Putin’s invasion, as well as a potent propaganda weapon. Over the past year and a half, videos of kamikaze drones chasing Russian service personnel to their deaths have become a distinctive genre on social media. They are the brainchild of Robert Brovdi, the head of Ukraine’s unmanned systems forces and founder of “Magyar’s Birds”. The black humor is essential during wartime. “It’s important for our own people to say we are not just surviving. We need to show we are flourishing and hitting back hard against the enemy.”

To many observers they will appear dehumanising and offensive. To many Ukrainians, however, they are a brutal reminder of the fate that awaits Russian soldiers who take part in Vladimir Putin’s invasion, as well as a potent propaganda weapon.
Over the past year and a half, videos of kamikaze drones chasing Russian service personnel to their deaths have become a distinctive genre on social media. They are the brainchild of Robert Brovdi, the head of Ukraine’s unmanned systems forces and founder of “Magyar’s Birds”, named after his call sign.
Brovdi’s 414th aviation strike brigade has pioneered the use of battlefield video, much of it recorded by first-person-view drones. The death videos are known as yoblyks, a portmanteau that combines the root of the Ukrainian for “fuck” with an affectionate diminutive form. The closest English translation is probably “fuckling”.

Early each morning, a military editor known by his call sign Catman sifts through battlefield clips recorded the previous day, selecting some for a two-minute compilation and adding pulsing or mystical music. A longer online reel is titled “Yoblyks of the Week”.

Defending his work, Catman said the videos played an important role in demoralising ordinary Russians and revealing the true cost of the Kremlin’s unprovoked war. “My goal is to show Russians that if they mobilise in Ukraine they will be killed, that it’s a one-way ticket and death is waiting for them,” he said.
He acknowledged that the clips were deliberately arranged to mock the victims, who are sometimes seen throwing sticks at the drones to try to knock them off course, or falling over as they run. Though the moment of death is not shown, the last frame is a closeup of a soldier’s face.
“We have a phrase: laughter kills fear. Our main task is to laugh at these enemies and to depict them as helpless. This boosts the morale of our forces,” he said. “It’s impossible for me to feel sorry for them. It’s war, after all, not a movie.”
Catman sitting in front of his computer: ‘My goal is to show Russians that if they mobilise in Ukraine they will be killed.’ Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian
Typically, the Russian soldiers are killed while walking or travelling by motorbike to the frontline. Some are unaware they are at risk from drones, Catman said, and appear to have been tricked by their commanders. “Their training is short. A lot die just two weeks after enlisting,” he said.
He described most of the soldiers as “banal donkey men” ordered to carry provisions or fuel to exposed Russian positions. Others drag communication cables. Since February, when Elon Musk shut down his satellite internet service Starlink in Russia, officers in the rear have struggled to contact frontline units.
Another member of Magyar’s Birds said there was compelling evidence the Russians were routinely misled about dangers. “You can see from the videos a lot of them are not even hiding,” he said. “They use their radio sets. A large number are fooled by the lie that everything will be OK, that they are going to their positions and are totally safe.”
The brigade has an archive of about 3,600 videos. Only two feature women, both wearing combat uniform and carrying assault rifles. “There is no difference for me. They are all enemies,” Catman said.
The videos play an important part in verifying Russian losses, which are running at more than 30,000 soldiers a month killed or injured, according to Kyiv.

Brovdi said he had no qualms about publishing material that many in the west might find distasteful and morally dubious. “God forbid they should ever experience pain. Because those of us in Ukraine who have experienced real physical pain from war would never agree with that perspective,” he said.
In daily posts, Brovdi uses language that some might find gratuitous, for instance describing Russians as “worms” pecked by “birds”.
He said: “When the war started, everything changed. There was a desire to humiliate the enemy as much as possible, not with typical words but exotic ones. It was only natural that military technical folklore and coinages such as ‘yoblyk’ found their way into my speech. They existed before AI.”
Robert ‘Magyar’ Brovdi, the commander of Ukraine’s unmanned systems forces. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian
The videos have sparked several trolling subgenres. Some Russian women post photos of themselves saying farewell to their husbands as they leave to take part in what Putin calls a “special military operation”. Ukrainians identify the men and subsequently reply with drone footage showing their deaths.
According to Catman, the yoblyks have a wide audience, including inside Russia. “There is very little information there about soldiers who go missing. Some people search and take screenshots. Mothers or wives then post messages saying something bad has happened to their loved ones,” he said.
Putin’s recruiters scramble to avoid second mass mobilisation as Ukraine losses mount
Read more
Pro-war Russian bloggers post images on Telegram channels of Ukrainian soldiers dying in battle. Other videos show the killing of unarmed Ukrainian prisoners of war – a crime. The Russian internet includes AI-generated fakes that purport to show Ukrainian military personnel criticising their army leadership.
Anatolii Loza, a Ukrainian volunteer who was captured and imprisoned by Russia and recently swapped, said he saw nothing wrong with yoblyks. “International law doesn’t apply to killing combatants on the field of battle,” he said. “The Russians come to shoot our soldiers and civilians. They are wearing uniform. They deserve their fate.”
Loza’s wife, Olena, said attitudes inside Ukraine hardened after spring 2022, when Russian forces killed hundreds of civilians in the cities of Bucha and Mariupol, leaving their bodies on the streets. Of yoblyks, she said: “I don’t find these videos informative. I’m already furious with Russia.”
At the HQ of Magyar’s Birds, Catman said black humour was essential during wartime. “It’s important for our own people to say we are not just surviving. We need to show we are flourishing and hitting back hard against the enemy.”

Putin Learns the Hard Way His Subversion Of Global Rules Damage Russia

2026-08-19T09:05:07.909-04:00

Putin is outraged that the contempt for international laws and norms that he has embraced is now being applied by others towards Russia.

Turnabout is fair play, like it or not. JL

Raj K reports in Medium:

European countries are stopping and seizing Russian ships (‘shadow fleet’) that are accused of carrying oil or grain in violation of sanctions. Under new European rules, there is talk of selling these seized goods and giving the grain to Ukraine. Putin said, “We can see that officials of some countries, breaking international maritime law have even considered seizing our ships and selling the property stolen from us.” They are setting a precedent where the rule of ‘might is right’ (Law of the Jungle) will apply.
Recently, Putin spoke on the ongoing issue of European governments and navies seizing Russian ‘shadow fleet’ ships near the coasts of Europe.
European countries (like France and Sweden) are stopping and seizing Russian ships (‘shadow fleet’) that are accused of carrying oil or grain in violation of sanctions.
Under new European rules, there is talk of selling these seized goods and giving the grain to Ukraine.
According to Reuters, Putin said, “We can see that officials of some countries, breaking international maritime law, are trying to restrict the movement of our economic operators’ ships…, and recently they have even considered seizing our ships and selling the property stolen from us.”
Putin directly called this ‘Piracy’. He clearly stated that if European countries continue seizing Russian ships, Russia will also seize European ships in return.
The biggest issue right now is whether the European Union (EU) has the legal right to stop ships in international waters and sell their goods.
Even if this action is being taken in the name of sanctions, seizing and selling the property of a sovereign nation violates the basic principles of ‘international maritime law’ (UNCLOS).
If Western countries start forcibly selling the property of other countries’ ships, they are setting a precedent where the rule of ‘might is right’ (Law of the Jungle) will apply.
Most of the world’s trade happens through sea routes (like the Indian Ocean, Baltic Sea, and Red Sea).
If Russia targets European commercial ships to take revenge, global shipping insurance rates will suddenly rise sharply.
As ship insurance becomes expensive, the transport cost of oil, food grains, and daily-use items will increase, which will directly impact the common person’s pocket in the form of inflation.
If this continues, the global free trade system created after World War II will completely collapse.
This could lead to a situation where merchant ships need to be armed (Arming Merchant Vessels), which will prove disastrous for the global supply chain.
Look, the “rules-based international order” created by Western countries after World War II has now completely broken down.
When America and Europe freeze any country’s property or seize ships according to their convenience, they themselves are driving the final nail into the coffin of international laws.
Now the world is not moving forward by ‘law’, but on the principle of ‘tit-for-tat’ and ‘might is right’.
Russia invaded Ukraine, and in return, Ukraine also shook Russia’s entire economy, meaning Russia received an equal reply. What decision Putin takes in the future regarding the shadow fleet will be decisive.
— — — — — — — — -
In 2015, when the Assad government was on the brink of falling, Russia intervened militarily and launched devastating airstrikes on rebels (especially groups active in Idlib).
The irony is that the jihadist fighters whom Russia spent years suppressing with its military power are today ruling Damascus as Syria’s new ‘Shara government’.
Russia now has to sit at the table with those same former rebels to negotiate for its military presence.
Recently, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed regarding the future of its bases located in Tartus and Khmeimim.
The naval base in Tartus was extremely important for Russia because it was Russia’s only deep-water port in the Mediterranean Sea.
Through it, Moscow maintained its naval surveillance over Southern Europe and the Middle East.
Under the new agreement, even though Russian soldiers will stay there, the control of civilian facilities and commercial berths will have to be handed over to the Syrian government.
Russia’s main goal in Syria now is not to establish dominance in the region, but to deliver supplies to its military units working in Africa (Sahel region) and the Wagner/Africa Corps.
Syria is no longer a ‘project power center’ for Russia, but has become merely a ‘transit hub’.
This MoU, signed between Syria and Russia on August 9, officially confirms that Russia has accepted the end of its decade-long aggressive military campaign in the Middle East.
Look, everyone has their own views on this whole matter. One group believes that Russia’s step back from the Tartus and Khmeimim bases in Syria, or handing over their civilian control to the Syrian government, is a major strategic loss for Putin.
On the other hand, practical thinkers argue that, being entangled in Ukraine, it was not wise for Russia to spend resources in Syria, 1,200 miles away from its border.
Getting out of Syria by cutting losses and keeping only a strategic ‘transit hub’ is a geopolitical compulsion for Moscow.
For now, looking at the situation, it seems that Moscow has accepted that it cannot maintain its old dominance in Syria while being entangled in the Ukraine war.
Even if Russia retained the bases as logistics hubs for Africa operations, its total control over the Mediterranean Sea has ended.
Assad’s fall and Syria’s new political scenario prove that the post-World War II global balance of power is now completely broken. Now the world will not run on the commands of just one or two superpowers.
You should also notice that not only is Russia’s influence declining in Syria, but America and the European Union are also losing their old grip on the Middle East.
As America and Russia step back from their distant military bases (outlying bases), considering them an economic and military burden, China, Turkey, and local regional powers are coming forward to fill this power vacuum.

Ukraine Springs Trap At Lyman, Encircles Advancing Russian Force

2026-08-19T08:48:13.001-04:00

The Russian salient at Lyman has become a trap, risking the Russian troops already there and causing the Kremlin to have to decide whether to commit more troops to save the advance but with the understanding that could mean having the additional forces cut off as well. JL

RFU News reports:

The Russian advance north of Lyman is now developing into a trap, with the troops at the front increasingly dependent on a corridor that Ukrainian forces are attacking from both sides. Ukrainian forces tightened the Russian salient northwest of Lyman by attacking the positions that protect its connection to the rest of the front. A major Ukrainian breakthrough developed around Novoselivka, placing the Russian positions around Yarova under direct threat from the flank. The Russian response has failed to secure the forward positions it was trying to reinforce, while Ukraine continues attacking the access that keeps the salient viable. The Ukrainian pincer around Lyman is increasingly forcing Russia toward a choice between abandoning the salient or risking more troops inside an increasingly vulnerable position.
Ukrainian forces finally tightened the Russian salient northwest of Lyman by attacking the positions that protect its connection to the rest of the front. A major Ukrainian breakthrough developed around Novoselivka, where troops pushed into Shandryholove and Derylove, placing the Russian positions around Yarova under direct threat from the flank. Russian forces answered by advancing north of Serednye toward Karpivka, slightly widening the neck of the salient and temporarily improving the connection to the forward grouping. That move gave Russia more space to sustain the position, but Ukrainian forces were already threatening the corridor behind Yarova that connected the forward troops to the rest of the front. If Ukrainian forces continue expanding around Shandryholove and Derylove, the Russian troops deeper inside the salient will have fewer secure routes for reinforcement, resupply, and withdrawal. The Russian advance north of Lyman is now developing into a trap, with the troops at the front increasingly dependent on a corridor that Ukrainian forces are attacking from both sides.
The danger around the salient is now serious enough that even Russian analysts are sounding the alarm. Russian analysts have warned that the northern flank around Lyman is becoming increasingly dangerous and could create major problems for the Russian grouping. They also acknowledge that the battlefield has become difficult to control, as dispersed frontline positions, extensive forests, and the movement of small groups make it harder to establish firm control across the area. As a result, Russian commanders struggle to determine which positions remain secure and where Ukrainian troops may already be threatening routes behind the line. Concern also extends beyond the troops holding the bulge itself, with problems around Lyman seen as a threat to Russian forces operating in neighboring sectors.
Despite these warnings, Russian command has continued sending more troops toward Yarova, deeper inside the threatened salient, instead of reinforcing the areas around Kolodyazi and Shandryholove where Ukrainian forces are pressing against the neck of the position. This means every additional unit sent toward Yarova becomes dependent on a corridor that Ukraine is already trying to constrict. At the same time, Ukrainian pressure on the routes toward Serednye and Yarova intensified, reducing the area Russian forces could safely maintain deeper inside the salient. Russian troops were pushed out of or withdrew from Yarova, and infiltration routes toward Pryshyb were also abandoned. These withdrawals show that the Russian response has failed to secure the forward positions it was trying to reinforce, while Ukraine continues attacking the access that keeps the salient viable.
If Ukrainian forces collapse the salient, Russia would face a choice between withdrawing from a much larger area northwest of Lyman or trying to hold increasingly isolated positions under growing encirclement risk. Either outcome could turn the problem around Yarova into a wider crisis across the northern approach to the city. A Russian withdrawal from the salient would remove the forward presence around Yarova and Serednye and shorten the line Ukraine has to contain north of the city. Ukrainian forces are already improving their position inside Lyman itself, where clearing operations have retaken the hospital and reduced Russian control in the urban area. South of the city, Ukrainian troops have also expanded from Ozerne toward Dibrova, adding pressure on the approaches around Lyman. Together, these developments would leave Russia operating from a less favorable position across several approaches to Lyman at once. Russian analysts are already warning that serious problems in the Lyman sector could create difficulties on neighboring axes. A collapse of the salient could add to that pressure by forcing Russia to commit manpower and resources to stabilizing a new defensive line.
Overall, the Ukrainian pincer around Lyman is increasingly forcing Russia toward a choice between abandoning the salient or risking more troops inside an increasingly vulnerable position. Sending additional units deeper only makes any later retreat more costly as the corridor behind them comes under greater pressure. If Russia pulls back, Ukraine could gain greater freedom to consolidate the recaptured area and potentially shift additional pressure toward the next Russian defensive positions once the new line is secured. That would give Ukrainian forces more options beyond the salient, while forcing Russia to stabilize a new defensive line under continued pressure.

The Reason AI Companies Are Buying, Scanning, Shredding Old Books

2026-08-19T08:36:51.746-04:00

Knowledge for AI's sake. Nothing quite captures the arrogant disregard for the rest of humanity like buying books, scanning their contents to train AI and then destroying the books (because that's cheaper than saving them).

But then that's how the AI industry seems to regard anything not AI, especially humanity. JL

Josh Marshall reports in Talking Points Memo:

A rapidly growing percentage of online content is produced by AI. If you try to train AI on the product of AI it’s a bit like locking a person in a sealed room and watching them slowly suffocate as they breath in the product of their cellular respiration. This has made the creators of AI increasingly desperate in their search for new artifacts of human intellect. The solution? Physical books published before 2022. Whatever their quality, their merits, whatever they’re about, they are the product of human minds. If you're scan a book at scale the costs of scanning and digitizing a book’s contents without damaging it are vastly higher. So what AI companies are doing is buying books, cutting off the spines, feeding them into industrial scale scanners and then throwing away.
Here is an update on a story you may not yet have heard of. It manages to be at once fascinating, deeply disturbing and a perfect living metaphor of our age. AI models are vulnerable to something called “model collapse.” In the early days of LLM-based AI there was a seemingly limitless store of online content to train it on. But that’s mostly been used up. Meanwhile, a rapidly growing percentage of online content is produced by AI. If you try to train AI on the product of AI it’s a bit like locking a person in a sealed room and watching them slowly suffocate as they breath in the product of their cellular respiration (CO2) rather than the fuel (oxygen) that makes the body function. Not a perfect analogy but you get the idea. This has made the creators of AI increasingly desperate in their search for new artifacts of human intellection — a phrase I heard once from the great Chaucer scholar John V. Fleming who died this past May — to feed into large language model AI systems.
The solution? Physical books published before 2022. You can guarantee as a matter of absolute certainty that whatever their quality, their merits, whatever they’re about, they are the product of human minds.
It’s relatively easy to scan a book without damaging it. But if you’re doing it at scale the costs of scanning and digitizing a book’s contents without damaging it are vastly higher. So what AI companies appear to be doing is buying up books, cutting off the spines, feeding them into industrial scale scanners and then throwing away.
All the reporting I’ve seen on this, as well as the latest report which I’ll describe in a moment is from a new outfit called 404 Media. It’s a tech news site, but not the kind you might be familiar with. It’s deeply conversant with all the ins and outs of tech but also deeply skeptical verging on hostile toward the people who run big tech and the ideas and motivations that inform it. So you get a lot of reporting on surveillance technology and stuff like what I’m describing here. I really recommend it.
Back in July, reporter Emanuel Maiberg published a fascinating piece about how all this started to come to light. There’s a sleepy and kind of slow-moving world of book peddlers out there who sell books online. They often work through book clearing houses. So someone purchases a book but the order comes through a clearing house so the book peddler doesn’t know the actual purchaser. Starting about a year ago a lot of these peddlers started seeing a dramatic increase in the volume of sales. Not only were sales coming in faster that any of them had seen but orders would come in for collections of books that had no logical connection to each other. So perhaps in the past you’d see an order from someone interested in ancient South Asia or the history of the industrial revolution. But now it was long lists of books with no logical connection to each other. The common denominator was they all had ISBN numbers. What’s more the buyers seemed indifferent to price.
As you’d expect this was quite the boon for the book peddlers — huge orders with no thought to price. But they started putting two and two together and suspecting that they were being purchased by AI companies. And as you’d imagine, if you’re in the used and, especially, rare book space you probably have an affection for physical books that goes beyond profit margins. In any case, that was what the July article was about.
When that article first came out I thought at least the aggregated headlines based on the 404 article were at least a bit misleading because it made it sound like these were all rare books. And that’s clearly not the case. It’s just that rare books or semi-rare ones get pulled into this massive AI vacuum. (To be clear, this wasn’t really 404. It was more so the way the headline and versions of the stories shifted as it was picked up by other publications.) It wasn’t clear how many of the books were genuinely rare. And a lot remained unclear in this first article since the companies involved don’t want to talk. And some of the clearing houses were already making clear to the AI companies that they had a potential optics problem on their hands.
One key detail Maiberg got from the book peddlers is that the books are never ones that don’t have an ISBN number. Those came into existence in the 1960s. So that probably creates a rough target range from about 1966 to 2022, seemingly nothing before that. What the book peddlers speculate is that the AI companies are trying to systematically scan all books ever published everywhere in the ISBN era. The older stuff would be valuable too. But it’s not susceptible to this kind of systematic harvesting.
In fairness I think it’s important to note what we all know: that lots of books are being thrown away all the time. That’s just in the nature of things. And many of these books probably aren’t terribly rare. But the issue is more than symbolic. A lot of these book peddlers are generally selling these books to libraries or other institutional buyers but now a lot of those books are being bought and tossed on to a metaphorical if not literal bonfire.
Which brings us back to today’s story. Apparently in the course of reporting the original story, one book peddler told Maiberg that he’d gotten a very large order for about 1,000 books through the clearinghouse Biblio. He agreed to put an Apple Airtag provided by 404 Media into the of the books. That allowed 404 to track this and the other thousand books’ journey to destruction.
They managed to track it as it flew from California to Wisconsin, then to Kenosha Regional Airport, then by truck to Colorado and eventually to Las Vegas. And that’s where the book chomping center was. I want to make sure you go check out the article this is based on so I’m not going to tell you the big tech company who runs this particular chompery. It’s one of the big boys. Just click here and the headline itself tells you the company name. But you’ll want to read the whole piece because there’s lots of additional detail.
Late Update: There’s an important part of this story that I neglected to add. Doesn’t change the big picture. But it’s an interesting part of the equation. Destructive scanning is much cheaper than non-destructive scanning. But in a lawsuit against Anthropic a judge ruled specifically that it was the destruction that made the scanning permissible under copyright law. The logic was that Anthropic bought the book and didn’t make a copy. It just transformed the format. There’s still just one book rather than the original and a copy. Because the original has been destroyed. I’ve seen some AI fanboys argue that the matter is really out of the scanning companies’ hands. They have to destroy the original or else they’ll be sued.
This is not a good argument. No one is forcing them to do this. And the company’s right to use these books to train their LLM-based AI models is at least questionable, certainly morally and possibly legally. In any case, just why they’re destroying the books is kind of beside the point, either it’s the cost of scanning or its the cost of having to compensate the rights holders over the books. Same difference. Same outcome.
Another question is what happens with the scans. To the extent you’re making these books harder to find or possibly even destroying a final copy you should at least make the scan available to the public. Perhaps they could be enjoined to deposit the copies with the Library of Congress. This raises a technical issue. I’m not sure the AI scanning process actually preserves a what we would call a digital copy of the book. It would be a simple matter to do both at once. Or a relatively simple matter. But I don’t think LLM’s keep full copies of the material they learn on. So I don’t think we can assume that copies, in the archival sense, are being made through this process. Possible, but I don’t think that’s clear.

Chief Russian Bank Economist Fired For Warning Of 'Economic Defeat' By West

2026-08-18T10:38:14.775-04:00

Not what the dictator wanted to hear. Especially in a public forum. But the experienced economist said what he believed, which is that Russia is falling behind economically and technologically, not just to the US, China and Europe but -get this -to Ukraine. He went on to say that Russia cannot win a war of attrition in the long run.

Comrade Klepach would be well advised to stay away from windows in tall buildings for the foreseeable future. JL

Olena Goncharova reports in the Kyiv Independent:

Andrei Klepach, the chief economist at Russian state development corporation VEB.RF, was fired on Aug. 16, a day after Russian media widely circulated his warnings that Russia was losing its economic and technological competition with the West. Speaking at an event organized by the Moscow Exchange’s Nikitsky Club, Klepach said Russia would be unable to sustain competition with the West in a prolonged confrontation and predicted that the country would eventually face a social crisis. "We are falling behind. We are losing both the technological and economic competition in the world. And, we are losing it not only to China and the US — in some respects, we are losing it to Ukraine whose economy has been partly destroyed. But despite everything, the Ukrainian economy is surviving. We will not win this competition in a war of attrition,"
Andrei Klepach, the chief economist at Russian state development corporation VEB.RF, was reportedly fired on Aug. 16, a day after Russian media widely circulated his warnings that Russia was losing its economic and technological competition with the West.
Russian independent media outlet The Bell reported Klepach’s dismissal on Aug. 16, citing two people familiar with the matter. The report came two days after The Moscow Times published excerpts from Klepach’s May remarks, which were subsequently picked up by other Russian media.
The Kyiv Independent can't immedately verify the claims.
Speaking at an event organized by the Moscow Exchange’s Nikitsky Club, Klepach reportedly said Russia would be unable to sustain competition with the West in a prolonged confrontation and predicted that the country would eventually face a social crisis.

According to one of The Bell’s sources, VEB.RF head Igor Shuvalov dismissed Klepach following an order "from above." A second source confirmed that the firing was connected to Klepach’s May remarks. The Bell said it had requested comment from VEB.RF.
Klepach had served as VEB.RF’s chief economist for 12 years. Before joining the state development corporation, he spent a decade at Russia’s Economic Development Ministry. He joined the ministry in 2004 as head of its macroeconomic forecasting department and served as deputy economic development minister from 2008 to 2014 under Elvira Nabiullina, Andrei Belousov, and Alexei Ulyukayev.
"We are falling behind. We are losing both the technological and economic competition in the world. And, as I have already said, we are losing it not only to China and the United States — in some respects, we are losing it to Ukraine," Klepach said.
"Ukraine’s economy has, of course, been partly destroyed, and there is a demographic catastrophe. But again, despite everything, the Ukrainian economy is surviving. Of course, it receives enormous financial assistance. (…) With that support, their military spending and their own expenditures amount to almost 50% of our budget," he was quoted as saying.

"We will not win this competition in a war of attrition," Klepach continued. "We have this illusion that everything there will collapse. It has not collapsed, and it will not. Our costs are growing."
"I believe Russia will not fall apart, but I am almost certain that we will arrive at a social crisis," he concluded. "Economically, we will not collapse, but we will continue to fall further behind, with all the consequences that entails."

What Happens When Putin's New Mobilization Fails?

2026-08-18T10:19:38.787-04:00

Putin's ground war has stalled and shows no signs of correcting the inefficiencies and incompetences of the past four-plus years. There are rumors he is beginning to implement a quiet 'soft' mobilization so as not to spark further popular resentment, but given Ukraine's success to date in thwarting increased Russian and North Korean troop deployments with drones, mines and counterattacks, there is little reason to believe the corrupt Russian system is capable of - or interested in - change to correct that.

The question then is, what will Putin do when his latest mobilization fails? China has reportedly nixed the nuclear option so further sabotage and provocation to keep Europe off balance look like the most probable tactics. But if the US midterm elections this fall return the Congress and Senate to Democratic control, his options will be further limited by their support for Ukraine. Either way, the war's evident failure means he has to continue it or risk being overthrown and eliminated himself. JL

Mick Ryan reports in Futura Doctrina:

Putin is rapidly running out of options for achieving even his minimalist goals for Ukraine, which would be the capture of all of the Donbas. But even that appears increasingly unlikely for the Russian ground forces. Putin will hope that the injection of a few hundred thousand extra troops might get him over the line, but even that is a doubtful proposition given the increases in effectiveness we have seen the Ukrainians demonstrate in 2026. He could double down, do more mobilization and step up the use of chemical weapons or even i`ndicate his willingness to employ nuclear weapons. However, his nuclear sabre rattling in the past has not shifted Ukrainian determination to hold on to their territory. And NATO has now moved beyond being deterred by these kinds of threats.
Putin is rapidly running out of options for achieving even his minimalist goals for Ukraine, which would be the capture of all of the Donbas. But even that appears increasingly unlikely for the Russian ground forces. Putin will hope that the injection of a few hundred thousand extra troops might get him over the line, but even that is a doubtful proposition given the increases in effectiveness we have seen the Ukrainians demonstrate in 2026.
Thus, if Putin’s additional troops don’t help him capture the Donbas in the coming year, what other options does he have?
First, he could immediately declare a ceasefire and hope that the Trump administration gives him credit for being a first mover in making peace and supporting his territorial claims in negotiations with Ukraine. It is possible, but it does not achieve any of Putin’s long-held claims on Ukraine and it is unlikely he will ever give up on these. It would also create problems for Putin at home – he will have all but nothing to show for (by that time) over 1.5 million casualties. Good luck creating a narrative of victory around that in Russia or elsewhere.
Second, he could double down, do more mobilization and step up the use of chemical weapons or even indicate his willingness to employ nuclear weapons. However, his nuclear sabre rattling in the past has not shifted Ukrainian determination to hold on to their territory. And NATO has now moved beyond being deterred by these kinds of threats by Putin. However, if serious intelligence came to light that Putin had given orders for potential nuclear strikes in Ukraine, this could change the stance of America and NATO. But it might also see China intervene to prevent the use of Russian nuclear weapons as it has apparently done in the past. Putin would not want that. So, this too is an unlikely pathway for Putin if his mobilization fails to secure the military objectives he wants to achieve.
Finally, Putin could choose a strategy of “hold in Ukraine, strike elsewhere” to deliver something that approximates a victory – and to test further the NATO alliance. While I am not calling this probable, it may be the most likely option for Putin in the event of a mobilization failure. It is likely he could secure a military victory in a short, sharp campaign against a Baltic nation while causing a crisis in NATO. With that he could potentially justify to the Russian people his disastrous strategy of the past five years. Importantly, would nations such as Spain or America come to the aid of “a small nation in eastern Europe and risk nuclear war” is a key question. Putin may see much to gain from such a split within NATO.
Mobilisation has not even commenced yet, so this is just speculation. But it is worth pondering just how the mobilisation effort might contribute to Russia’s war effort - and how might the situation be exploited if this mobilisation fails to change Russia’s fortunes.

Russia's 2026 Offensive Has Stalled By Ukraine "Across Multiple Fronts"

2026-08-18T09:54:26.042-04:00

Ukrainian forces have reportedly stalled attempted Russian advances across multiple fronts as the summer begins to wind down.

There has been an uptick in Russian claims of successes, which have almost always been disproved, usually within hours. The independent assessments concur that Russia's infiltration tactic of sending small groups of two or three men has not added up to anything approaching a sustainable ability to take and hold territory. JL

The Kyiv Post reports:

Russian forces continued offensive operations across several sectors of the front on Aug. 15 and 16 but failed to make advances across multiple fronts. Russian claims of advances remain disputed as the Kremlin continued to claim battlefield gains that were not independently confirmed. Russia continues to apply pressure across a wide section of the front, but the attacks have yet to translate into a confirmed breakthrough.

Russian forces continued offensive operations across several sectors of the front on Aug. 15 and 16 but failed to make confirmed advances.
According to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), Russian troops attacked in the northern Sumy region, northern Kharkiv region, the Kupyansk, Borova, Slovyansk, Dobropillya, Pokrovsk, Novopavlivka, Hulyaipole and western Zaporizhzhia sectors. Neither Russian nor Ukrainian sources reported ground activity in the Kherson sector on Aug. 16.
Despite the broad pressure, ISW did not confirm a Russian breakthrough on any of these axes.

Small infiltration groups probe Ukrainian positions
One notable development was the continued use of small Russian infantry groups to penetrate Ukrainian defensive positions.
The deputy commander of a Ukrainian battalion operating in the Sumy sector said Russian troops are using groups of just one to three soldiers to move between Ukrainian positions.

He said the groups exploit grass more than 2 meters (6.6 feet) high, which makes them difficult to detect, while Russian forces continue aerial reconnaissance, counterbattery fire, remote mining and drone strikes.
The Ukrainian officer also said Russian forces showed no signs of weapons shortages and were using drone attacks and remote mining to complicate Ukrainian logistics.
Similar infiltration tactics were reported farther south. ISW said Ukrainian forces recently cleared Russian infiltrators from western Kostyantynivka, while Russian troops continued attempting to establish positions in contested areas.

Russian claims of advances remain disputed
Russia also continued to claim battlefield gains that were not independently confirmed.
The Russian Defense Ministry claimed that Russian forces had seized Kudiivka north of Kharkiv, portraying the settlement as a potential “gateway” toward Kharkiv city. However, a source reporting on the Russian Northern Grouping of Forces said Russian troops were fighting inside the settlement but had not established strongholds there.
A similar discrepancy emerged around Vilcha, northeast of Kharkiv. Russian authorities claimed to have captured the settlement in December 2025, but a Russian source described it as a contested “gray zone” on Aug. 16. The source said Russian troops were entering the area without reliable information about minefields, leaving them exposed to Ukrainian artillery and drone strikes.

ISW also reported on Russian claims of gains in the Oleksandrivka sector. Russian milbloggers claimed Moscow’s forces had retaken several settlements previously liberated by Ukraine, but ISW assessed that Ukrainian forces had liberated at least 626 square kilometers (241.7 square miles) of tactically significant territory in the area between January and August 2026.
Russia intensifies strikes ahead of future offensives
Although Russian ground advances remained limited, Moscow continued to intensify its use of glide bombs and drones against Ukrainian positions and logistics.
Russian forces repeatedly struck Slovyansk and other parts of the so-called Fortress Belt with FAB glide bombs, first-person-view (FPV) drones and Molniya-2 strike drones. ISW reported that Russia is conducting a battlefield air interdiction campaign designed to degrade Ukrainian ground lines of communication and prepare the area for future attacks on Slovyansk and Kramatorsk.

Russian forces also used glide bombs against Dobropillya, including strikes reportedly targeting Ukrainian drone positions and temporary deployment sites.
At the same time, Ukrainian forces continued striking Russian logistics and military infrastructure. Ukrainian troops hit Russian ammunition and equipment warehouses in the occupied Donetsk region and struck a railway bridge in the occupied Zaporizhzhia region that Russian forces use for logistics.
Ukraine also targeted a Russian Bastion-M coastal missile system in occupied Crimea, which Russia uses to launch Onyx and Zircon missiles against Ukraine.
Overall, ISW’s assessment shows that Russia continues to apply pressure across a wide section of the front, but the attacks have yet to translate into a confirmed breakthrough.

Nvidia Commits $105 Billion To Back OpenAI Ohio Data Center

2026-08-18T09:15:01.585-04:00

As Nvidia announced its $105 billion in financial support for one of the world's largest data centers in the latest of its circular deals lending money to customers who buy its products, the company's CEO, Jensen Huang, made a noteworthy statement intended to explain the investment.

He said that AI companies are "growing faster than their balance sheets and long term credit profiles can support." That used to be a market signal that a company should rein in its borrowing. In the AI economy, that is apparently a signal for the world's largest supplier of AI chips and wealthiest corporation to lend them the money to keep going. How this ends well for the companies, their employees, lenders, investors and the public is not explained, presumably because no one really knows. JL

Kalley Huang reports in the New York Times:

Nvidia agreed to spend as much as $105 billion to back one of the world’s largest data centers, which is being built in Ohio and will be leased to OpenAI. Nvidia’s financing for the data center, that could cost as much as $500 billion, is part of the complex dealmaking behind the A.I. boom. Using unusual arrangements with chipmakers, cloud computing providers and governments, OpenAI and Anthropic are gaining access to computing power that they could not afford themselves. Many of these deals are circular, with an A.I. start-up receiving billions of dollars from technology giants before spending those billions on the same companies to pay for chips, cloud computing and other services. Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s CEO, said that A.I. labs “are growing faster than their balance sheets and long-term credit profiles can support.”
Nvidia said on Monday that it had agreed to spend as much as $105 billion to back one of the world’s largest data centers, which is being built in Ohio and will be leased to OpenAI.
The sum is one of the largest from Nvidia toward supporting A.I. labs that are seeking more computing power. Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s chief executive, said in a blog post that the company would use the money to guarantee “lease and power payments” at the site. He added that A.I. labs “are growing faster than their balance sheets and long-term credit profiles can support.”
Nvidia’s financing for the data center in Pike County, Ohio, a project that could cost as much as $500 billion, is part of the complex dealmaking behind the A.I. boom. Using unusual arrangements with chipmakers, cloud computing providers and governments, start-ups like OpenAI and Anthropic are gaining access to computing power that they could not afford by themselves.
Many of these deals are circular, with an A.I. start-up receiving billions of dollars from technology giants before spending those billions on the same companies to pay for chips, cloud computing and other services. Nvidia previously invested $30 billion in OpenAI, and the data center in Ohio will use only Nvidia’s chips. Mr. Huang said in the blog post that Nvidia’s financing for the Ohio data center was not circular because “OpenAI will pay the lease.”
In turn, OpenAI said in a blog post that it would lease the Ohio site “only as completed capacity becomes available,” meaning it may not pay anything until the data center starts coming online in 2028. OpenAI agreed to a 20-year lease for the site, which will provide it eight gigawatts of computing capacity, or enough electricity to power about six million households in the United States.
Nvidia’s financing will support 4.25 of those gigawatts, though the company could extend its arrangement to the remaining gigawatts.
Nvidia and OpenAI had previously discussed the chipmaker’s providing $250 billion in financial backing for the Ohio data center.
Nvidia also said on Monday that it had agreed to invest $1.5 billion in SB Energy, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank that will build, own and operate the data center in Ohio. Nvidia has taken other steps to finance the A.I. boom. Last week, the company and six giant asset managers, private equity firms and banks announced an effort to raise $500 billion in financing for Nvidia’s customers to pay for chips, data centers and computing power.
(The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft in 2023, claiming copyright infringement of news content related to A.I. systems. The two companies have denied those claims.)

In Combat, Exoskeletons Made Artillerymen Faster, Less Fatigued

2026-08-17T10:46:16.127-04:00

Ukrainian artillerymen have to carry 30 shells a day which weigh 50 kilograms - 100 pounds. Artillery brigades using exoskeletons found they reduced leg muscle load by 30%, making the troops faster and less prone to fatigue at operational tempo for longer periods of time.

This, in turn, contributed to increased rates of fire and more accurate. Smart use of technology enhances performance and results for Ukraine again. JL

Wes O'Donnell reports:

At current tempo, Ukraine’s 147th Brigade artillery crews carry 30 shells per day: at 1,200 kilograms per soldier, per day. That’s a small car’s worth of explosives, manually humped to a howitzer by one man. Ukraine has deployed exoskeletons to try to fix that. It is a leg exoskeleton with hinged joints along the thighs and knees, weighing 2 kilograms. It buckles at the waist and legs, wraps behind the user’s back, and has two hip actuators. It has 10 intelligent operating modes, over a temperature range of minus10 to 60 degrees Celsius, reaches an assisted movement speed up to 20 km/h, and supports assisted walking for up to 17.5 kms. The AI mode adapts in real time to the load on the soldier’s legs and spine. “According to combat test results, troops become less fatigued, work faster, and maintain combat effectiveness longer.” An exoskeleton reducing leg muscle load 30% and cuts fatigue contributes to rate of fire, accuracy, and the ability to sustain operations at tempo.
I have this theory about my Army service; totally unscientific and based only on my experience: The constant physical stress I subjected my body to, for a solid decade (about 20 years old to 30 years old), put me in the best shape of my life through my 30s.
Running, rappelling, hiking with rucks, quick bursts of speed when it was time to shoot and move, swimming, and of course, the normal daily time dedicated to physical training (PT)… as if we needed it.
But when I hit 40, the butcher’s bill came due. Now my life is constant pain, and it feels like I can pull a back muscle simply by reaching for a Dr. Pepper.
And, by the way, I was in the “light” infantry! Imagine what those artillery guys go through… I watched artillery crews do things to their bodies that no physical therapist would ever sign off on.
Press enter or click to view image in full size
Me before my body started a guerilla campaign against me. Author’s collection.
Loading 155mm rounds all day is exactly as brutal as it sounds, each shell weighing roughly 50 kilograms, crews running 15 to 30 of them per shift, day after day, in conditions that make the CrossFit gym crowd look like they’re doing a mild warm-up.
It’s actually surprising to me that it’s 2026 and (what was) the most technologically advanced military on the planet still goes to war in cloth uniforms with no mechanical assistance.
Well, Ukraine, never one to let a good tech idea rot on the shelf, may claim the mantle as the new “most technologically advanced” military on the planet.
And they deserve it.
At current operational tempo, Ukraine’s 147th Brigade crews are carrying up to 30 shells per day: at approximately 1,200 kilograms of ammunition per soldier, per day.
That’s a small car’s worth of high explosives, manually humped to a howitzer by one man, while someone is trying very hard to kill you.
Now, Ukraine has just deployed exoskeletons to fix that on the Pokrovsk front, in live combat, this week.
Ukraine’s 7th Rapid Reaction Corps of the Air Assault Forces became the first unit in the country’s Defense Forces to deploy exoskeletons in real combat conditions, with test samples already in use at logistics and combat positions.
The unit receiving them is the 147th Separate Artillery Brigade, the same outfit running French CAESAR self-propelled howitzers and Ukrainian-made Bohdana-BG towed 155mm systems on one of the most contested sections of the front line.
I can’t embed Facebook video for some reason, but you can watch the Ukrainian exoskeleton at work HERE.
Pokrovsk has been under sustained Russian pressure for months. This isn’t a quiet corner of the war where you’d want to test new equipment. But that’s exactly the point.
The system is a leg exoskeleton designed as rigid arcs with hinged joints along the thighs and knees, built from aluminum alloy, weighing 2 kilograms.
It buckles at the waist and legs, wraps behind the user’s back, and features two hip actuators that serve as hinges.
The whole thing folds into a briefcase.
According to the Ukrainian captions in the video, it has 10 intelligent operating modes, operates over a temperature range of minus 10 to 60 degrees Celsius, reaches an assisted movement speed of up to 20 km/h, and supports assisted walking for up to 17.5 kilometers.
The AI mode adapts in real time to the load on the soldier’s legs and spine.
Colonel Vitalii Serdiuk, the 7th Corps’ deputy commander, said what the numbers already tell you: “According to test results, they become less fatigued, work faster, and maintain combat effectiveness for longer.”
Less fatigued. Faster. Combat-effective for longer.
On a front where Russia is grinding forward at 70 meters a day trying to outlast Ukrainian resolve.
Artillery is the dominant arm of this war. Russia fires somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000 rounds per day at Ukrainian positions.
Ukraine fires considerably fewer, the munitions shortage has been real and persistent, but every round matters at a rate that’s hard to overstate. The crews operating CAESAR howitzers and Bohdana systems are working at a pace that would have been considered extraordinary in any previous conflict.
Actually, for crews of the Ukrainian-made Bohdana-BG towed howitzer, shells must be lifted to a greater height without a dedicated loader, which means a human being is manually performing a full-body lift of a 50-kilogram round. Richard Simmons eat your heart out.
But seriously, cumulative physical degradation in artillery crews is a real operational problem that doesn’t show up in debriefs the same way vehicle losses do, but absolutely shows up in sustained combat effectiveness over weeks and months.
Not to mention the long-term wear and tear on these soldiers’ bodies post-war.
An exoskeleton that reduces leg muscle load by 30 percent and cuts fatigue meaningfully is a direct contribution to rate of fire, accuracy, and the unit’s ability to sustain operations at tempo.
“Caesar crews destroy the enemy even on approach, and every minute and every shot matter,” the brigade said.
Press enter or click to view image in full size
147th Separate Artillery Brigade — AFU
The Techno-Assault Concept
The corps frames the introduction of such technologies as part of developing “techno-air assault” capabilities; a concept focused on using state-of-the-art systems in air assault operations.
This is the same corps that trains soldiers to counter Russian FPV drone attacks using virtual reality headsets and a special dummy pump-action shotgun, which is either the most interesting training aid in any military inventory right now, or the most terrifying, depending on your perspective.
Ukraine thinks about war like this:
Where human bodies are the limiting factor, insert technology.
Where human attention is the bottleneck, use AI.
Where human endurance degrades under sustained combat, find a mechanical solution.
Ukraine doesn’t have Russia’s manpower pool. It’s been operating on that constraint since February 2022. The response has been to make each soldier more capable rather than simply adding more soldiers, which is both born of necessity and brilliant doctrine.
Where the US is on this
Since we’re talking about exoskeletons on a battlefield, it’s worth noting where America’s own programs stand, because the contrast is instructive.
The US Army’s SABER is a soft, wearable exosuit strapped to the back and around each leg, designed to reduce spinal strain. Lockheed Martin’s ONYX is a lower-body exoskeleton with knee actuators. Neither system is standard-issue for American forces. Both exist in the research and limited-testing phase after years of development.
DoD — Public domain. Probably still 20 years from fielding…
YEARS of development! The American tech pipeline is infuriating.
Ukraine’s 147th Artillery Brigade is running a 2-kilogram aluminum exoskeleton with AI-adaptive modes and a mobile app in a live combat zone this week.
I’m not saying Ukraine’s system is more advanced than what Lockheed or the Army’s research labs are building. I’m just saying Ukraine’s system is on the Pokrovsk front and the American systems aren’t.
That distinction between fielded and promising is the same one that keeps coming up in every technology comparison between this war and Western procurement timelines.
Ukraine skips the comfortable middle phases and goes straight to live testing under the worst possible conditions.
The cost of the Ukrainian exoskeleton, for context, amounts to several tens of thousands of hryvnias, which at current exchange rates is roughly a few hundred to a few thousand dollars per unit.
So, let me get this straight: Ukraine’s is faster, cheaper, and on the battlefield right now… Got it. Compared to the US where until very recently, the average US infantryman was still using an AR-style assault rifle from before Vietnam.
Since we’re talking about Ukrainian tech…
Ukraine has also received two Phantom MK-1 humanoid robots for battlefield evaluation, one of the first real-world tests of humanoid soldier technology anywhere.
The exoskeleton deployment and the humanoid robot evaluation are happening simultaneously, on the same front, driven by the same logic: the country that runs out of capable soldiers first… loses.
That logic should be familiar to us who have watched how Ukraine has approached every other technology gap in this war.
It couldn’t match Russia’s artillery. So it built drones.
It couldn’t replace its lost armor fast enough. So it developed cheap anti-armor systems and layered drone tactics.
It couldn’t sustain strike campaigns with scarce, permissioned ATACMS rounds. So it built the FP-5 Flamingo.
Every constraint has produced an innovation response, usually faster and cheaper than any Western procurement process would have allowed. The exoskeleton is the same pattern applied to the most fundamental resource in any army: the body of the soldier carrying the ammunition.
Colonel Serdiuk put it in terms any veteran can understand: every minute matters, every shot matters, and a soldier who’s less exhausted shoots better and sustains longer.
The technology doesn’t replace the artilleryman.
It keeps him functional for the entire shift instead of degrading through it.

North Korean Train Carrying Missiles To Russia Blown Up In Siberia

2026-08-17T09:52:25.855-04:00

As Russia becomes more dependent on North Korea for military support, including troops, artillery and now missiles, the rails lines connecting the two countries become a more important target.

Ukrainian forces identified and destroyed a train carrying North Korean missiles to the front. The sabotage occurred close to the North Korean-Russian border and in difficult terrain, making reconstruction of the line more difficult. The missiles, their warheads and accompanying troops were eliminated. JL

RFU News reports:

6,000 kilometers from the front line, explosions destroyed a train transporting KN-Twenty-Three and KN-Twenty-Four ballistic missiles together with railcars loaded with artillery ammunition on the Trans-Siberian Railway. The attack occurred close to North Korea. The detonation destroyed the train, devastated part of the surrounding railway infrastructure, and halted traffic along the affected section. Remotely controlled explosive charges were placed beneath the railway tracks before being detonated as it entered a difficult section of the line. Choosing such terrain aims to maximize destruction while making restoration more complicated. The explosion triggered a chain reaction that detonated the warheads and the accompanying ammunition. The KN missiles carry a warhead weighing five-hundred kilograms. This ranks among the deepest Ukrainian attacks inside Russia.

Ukrainian army sources revealed a reported sabotage operation against a Russian military train carrying North Korean weapons that was targeted around six thousand kilometers from the frontline. According to Ukrainian military sources, simultaneous explosions destroyed a train transporting KN-Twenty-Three and KN-Twenty-Four ballistic missiles together with railcars loaded with artillery ammunition on the Trans-Siberian Railway. The attack occurred geographically much closer to North Korea than to Ukraine itself, and the resulting detonation destroyed the train, devastated part of the surrounding railway infrastructure, and halted traffic along the affected section. Official confirmation from Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate has not yet been released, but once confirmed, this would rank among the deepest Ukrainian operations conducted inside Russian territory.
According to operatives within Ukrainian intelligence circles, the operation was preceded by a lengthy intelligence effort. The reported shipment was allegedly tracked from the vicinity of the North Korean border as it moved westward across Russia. Such an operation would have required establishing the train’s timetable, identifying where it would slow down, and selecting terrain where repairs after an attack would be particularly difficult. Ukrainian operatives have also needed to determine exactly which convoy contained the strategic cargo before committing valuable assets. Local assistance cannot be ruled out, as some remote Russian regions have long complained of economic neglect, potentially making discreet cooperation with outside intelligence services more feasible. Ukrainian agents would have also exploited the well-known corruption among the Russian administration, as such officials with access to railway schedules or cargo manifests could be bribed to reveal when a valuable shipment would pass a specific location.
According to the reports, remotely controlled explosive charges were allegedly placed beneath the railway tracks and near critical points of the train before being detonated as it entered a difficult section of the line. Choosing such terrain aims to maximize destruction while making restoration substantially more complicated.
The effects of the explosion were dramatic, as they triggered a chain reaction that detonated the missile warheads and the accompanying ammunition cargo. The KN missiles carry a warhead weighing roughly five-hundred kilograms, meaning even a single detonation is capable of causing severe destruction.
The exact number of missiles reportedly aboard the train has not been established yet, but the combined explosion reached the equivalent of dozens of tons of TNT, excavated a crater more than fifteen meters deep, and completely incinerated both the locomotive and the convoy. Burning fragments from solid-fuel rocket motors ignited surrounding vegetation and railway infrastructure.
The consequences extend well beyond the destroyed shipment, even though a Ukrainian intelligence source stated that the objective was to ensure none of the missiles intended for attacks on Ukrainian cities survived the operation. However, the Trans-Siberian Railway is Russia’s main east-west rail artery, stretching roughly nine-thousand-three-hundred kilometers from European Russia to the Pacific coast and connecting industrial centers with trade routes toward China, Mongolia, and the Korean Peninsula. It carries tens of millions of tonnes of freight annually, making it one of Russia’s most important logistical networks. Disrupting even one section can create delays of up to several weeks while damaged track, electrical systems, and wreckage are cleared and repaired.
Overall, the reported sabotage represents a direct Ukrainian response to the expanding North Korean military assistance to Russia, which includes missiles, launchers for them, artillery shells, and personnel for both the delivered systems and infantry. Destroying a huge single shipment would deny Russia valuable weapons immediately, while simultaneously damaging the railway itself could delay subsequent deliveries, increasing the logistical cost of relying on long-distance military support from North Korea.

Ukraine Is Steadily Liberating Russian Territory At Notable Scale

2026-08-17T09:37:11.210-04:00

It's generally better to be lucky. But if you are capable of taking advantage of your enemy's misfortune, you can make your own.

In the case of Ukraine's shockingly successful offensive retaking large swaths of Russian-held territory in the country's south, it was a bit of both. The Ukrainians started probing what they correctly perceived were weak Russian defenses in late January. But when the Russians lost their Starlink access, the Ukrainians were ready and began armored assaults which would not have been possible had the Kremlin's forces had adequate electronic communications and defenses. Though the Russians have finally stabilized to some degree, the Ukrainian gains have been large and strategically significant. JL

Phillips O'Brien reports in his substack and David Axe reports in Trench Art:

We are now more than halfway through the summer season. This year, the reports are not about Russian advances, but Ukrainian ones. The scale of Ukraine's counteroffensive in southeastern Ukraine is becoming clear. In six months, Ukraine's 78th, 79th, 80th, 82nd, and 95th Air Assault Brigades and the 1st and 425th Assault Regiments—tens of thousands of troops—marched through gaps in Russian defenses. In contrast to the usual assault tactics, the Ukrainians attacked in tanks and other armored vehicles, counting on the Russians' connectivity problems to clear a path. Working in Ukraine's favor: better operational planning, a campaign to suppress Russian air defenses, deeper strikes on Russian logistics, Ukrainian drone superiority at the tactical level—and the Starlink cutoff. But the cutoff is the one that arrived all at once, and just as Ukrainian armor was starting to move. The reality was that the Ukrainians had gained ground. A lot of it.
We are now more than halfway through the summer season, and in the past this is often when reports about the successes of Russia’s summer offensive would be heating up in the western press. This was, for instance, when the stories about the imminent fall of Pokrovsk started circulating in 2024 (it actually took the Russians another year to take the city) and last summer at this time the reporting was all about the manpower crisis that Ukraine was facing which was going to lead to even greater Russian advances.
I say that because this year, the reports are not about steady Russian advances, but actually of some Ukrainian ones. Three days ago, the Ukrainian high command gave an update on its offensive actions so far in 2026. Zelensky summarized these in his evening address on August 12.
The offensive operation, which lasted from January through August of this year, was carried out by warriors of the Airborne Assault Forces and other units involved. Its main objective was to disrupt the Russian occupiers’ plans for further advances and push Russian forces beyond the administrative border of the Dnipro region.
Thanks to the active operations of Ukrainian defenders, significant losses were inflicted on the occupation contingent. Russian losses amount to at least 9,550 killed and more than 6,600 wounded. Ukraine’s “exchange fund” was also replenished.
Over the course of the operation, 745 square kilometers of territory were liberated, and 26 villages in the Dnipro, Donetsk, and Zaporizhzhia regions were returned to Ukrainian control.
General Drapatyi (on screen—right of the two) briefs President Zelensky.
Note: The Institute for The Study of War claims using a very conservative estimate that Ukraine has liberated between 600-700 square kilometres—which is not that much lower.

The scale of Ukrainian forces' counteroffensive in southeastern Ukraine early this year is finally becoming clear. In six months of maneuver starting on 29 January, a clutch of Ukrainian units, including the 78th, 79th, 80th, 82nd, and 95th Air Assault Brigades and the 1st and 425th Assault Regiments—tens of thousands of troops, in all—marched through gaps in Russian defenses and, according to Ukrainian officials, liberated around 745 square km and 26 settlements. Mostly in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast but also in neighboring Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk Oblasts.
That is Kyiv's own accounting, and it is the high end. The Institute for the Study of War, which maps control from geolocated imagery, put the figure at roughly 627 square km across the Oleksandrivka direction and the northern Hulyaipole direction—while noting its own conservative method probably undercounts. Either number describes the largest Ukrainian territorial gain since 2023.
The Ukrainian gains helped to offset Russian gains around the last few free cities in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk Oblast. Between the start of February and the end of July, Russian regiments captured a net total of just 260 square km of Ukrainian soil, according to a tally by the Black Bird Group. It would've been more than 1,000 square km if those air assault and assault units hadn't been busy clearing the Russians from a wide swathe of the southeast.
The Ukrainian counteroffensive kicked off on 29 January. Three days later, Elon Musk's Starlink bricked Russia's thousands of smuggled and stolen satellite terminals. Practically overnight, the Russians lost their best method for controlling small drones and guiding assault units across the disputed gray zone. Drones couldn't fly. Troops couldn't navigate.
Ukrainian commanders surely knew their communications advantage wouldn't last: the Russians would eventually adapt with new methods of command and control. Seizing the opportunity, Ukrainian paratroopers and assault troops pressed the attack. And in stark contrast to the usual assault tactics for both sides, the Ukrainians attacked in tanks and other armored vehicles, counting on the Russians' connectivity problems to clear a path for heavy forces.
The blackout was not the only thing working in Ukraine's favor. ISW credits the gains to five reinforcing factors: better operational planning, a campaign to suppress and destroy Russian air defenses, deeper strikes on Russian logistics, Ukrainian drone superiority at the tactical level—and the Starlink cutoff. But the cutoff is the one that arrived all at once, and it arrived just as Ukrainian armor was starting to move.

Mechanized assaults
Not all the vehicles got through. The assault troops lost one up-armored M-1 Abrams tank in early February. But by March, other assault forces M-1s were engaging Russian troops at point-blank range with their 120-mm main guns. After clearing a few disputed villages along a 45-km front between Dobropillya and Zelenyi Hai, the Ukrainians focused their maneuver and firepower on Komar, 12 km southeast of Zelenyi Hai.
The Ukrainians "started a slow and quiet offensive, with very few videos and small teams, during April and May," mapper Clément Molin recalled. The strict information security obscured the Ukrainian moves for all but the closest observers, allowing Ukrainian commanders to press their attacks without drawing too much attention—and risking a Russian countercounteroffensive.
By summer, the Ukrainians were within mortar range of Komar. Embarrassed Russian commanders resorted to sending out small teams on virtual suicide missions to plant Russian flags in disputed territory. The flags could create the impression of Russian control on terrain that, in fact, neither side controlled. "Russia is trying to intoxicate us with flag videos, which are meant to hide the real situation to both us and their command," Molin wrote.
The reality was that the Ukrainians had gained ground. A lot of it.

Announcing the results on 12 August, Ukrainian officials also claimed 9,550 Russian troops killed and more than 6,600 wounded—figures no independent body has verified. Former commander in chief Oleksandr Syrskyi, who planned the operation, said it proved the Ukrainian army "is capable not only of steadfastly holding its defences, but also of launching offensives, seizing the initiative, and liberating Ukrainian land."

Apple With Alibaba Has Built AI Only For China

2026-08-17T08:51:49.133-04:00

While the tech media have spent the past year mocking Apple for its perceived failure to develop competitive AI, the company was quietly partnering with China's Alibaba Group to create AI specifically for Chinese users. And, even more impressively, to become the first foreign company to gain Chinese government approval.

Even if, as is sure to happen, the other big US tech companies rush to follow suit, the terms will be harsher - if they ever gain them - and Apple will have further secured its brand prominence and first mover advantage. This is a stunning strategic move which further roils the AI market at an already sensitive time. JL

Cris Tolomia reports in Quartz:

Apple has built its own large language model targeting the China market in collaboration with Alibaba Group. A China-specific model would give Apple greater control over the AI experience in its most competitive overseas market. Such an outcome would also position Apple as the first foreign company Beijing has cleared to deploy its own proprietary AI model in China — a significant milestone for a U.S. firm at a time of deepening trade and diplomatic friction between the two nations over AI. The planned rollout follows a regulatory process that concluded last month, when China's Cyberspace Administration registered Apple's generative AI service, clearing the way for Apple Intelligence to reach Chinese iPhones. Alibaba confirmed that its Qwen model will be integrated into Apple Intelligence across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and visionOS for users in China. Apple was also working with Baidu to develop Apple Intelligence features for Chinese iPhone users.
Apple $AAPL +0.22% has built its own large language model targeting the China market in collaboration with Alibaba Group, according to Reuters, citing three sources close to the situation. The development signals a shift away from Apple's earlier strategy of depending on outside partners' models to deliver AI capabilities to its China devices.

A China-specific model would give Apple greater control over the AI experience in its most competitive overseas market, according to Reuters. Such an outcome would also position Apple as the first foreign company Beijing has cleared to deploy its own proprietary AI model in China — a significant milestone for a U.S. firm at a time of deepening trade and diplomatic friction between the two nations over artificial intelligence.
Apple Intelligence, the company's suite of AI tools, is expected to launch in China in the coming months following an iOS update, according to the same people. Questions remain about how Apple's proprietary model will fit into the broader picture alongside the Chinese third-party models it is also using, and the precise technical relationship between them has not been disclosed.

The planned rollout follows a regulatory process that concluded last month, when China's Cyberspace Administration registered Apple's generative AI service, clearing the way for Apple Intelligence to reach Chinese iPhones. Alibaba confirmed that its Qwen model will be integrated into Apple Intelligence across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and visionOS for users in China. Apple was also working with Baidu to develop Apple Intelligence features for Chinese iPhone users.
The previous week, Apple put out a guide in Chinese detailing how eligible Mac users in mainland China could link Qwen with Siri and the Writing Tools feature. The guide has since been taken down by Apple, with no reason given.
The tie-up between Apple and Alibaba became public in February 2025, when Alibaba chairman Joe Tsai took the stage at the World Governments Summit in Dubai and revealed that Apple had selected Alibaba to power its phones in China. "They talked to a number of companies in China. In the end they chose to do business with us," Joe Tsai said at the time. The rollout was subsequently delayed as Apple worked to adapt its features to Chinese regulations.

China remains a critical market for Apple. Analysts and observers had pointed to the lack of AI capabilities on iPhones in China as a drag on sales, with buyers increasingly turning to homegrown device makers whose handsets come with AI features already embedded.
Apple and Alibaba did not respond to requests for comment.

Russian Casualties Predicted To Rise 50% "When Leaves Fall, Winter Sets In"

2026-08-16T07:36:17.138-04:00

Russian casualties have been the worst of the war on a monthly basis this year. But the Ukrainians are predicting those losses will get worse as fall arrives - potentially one and a half times as many - as the trees lose their leaves, the Russians lose their cover and Ukraine's drones become even more efficient at finding and killing. JL

Stanislav Pohorislov reports in Ukraine Pravda:

Russian troop losses at the front will rise once the leaves fall and winter sets in."In winter... there will be one and a half times more of them [Russians killed – ed.] straight away. As soon as the leaves fall, we'll have a bit more room for manoeuvre and the thermal imagers will work better." Russian losses could rise to 35,000-40,000 a month during this period. One of Ukraine's strategic goals is to inflict up to 50,000 casualties on Russian forces each month to make the war unsustainable for Russia.
Kyrylo Veres, Commander of the Unmanned Systems Forces' K-2 Brigade and a Hero of Ukraine, has predicted that Russian troop losses at the front will rise once the leaves fall and winter sets in.
Source: Veres in an interview with Ukrainska Pravda
Quote: "In winter... there will be one and a half times more of them [Russians killed – ed.] straight away. As soon as the leaves fall, we'll have a bit more room for manoeuvre and the thermal imagers will work better."
Details: Veres said Russian losses could rise to 35,000-40,000 a month during this period.
Quote: "I think there'll be an improvement. That doesn't mean the improvement will be noticeable within a day. We have a huge enemy, but we need to work towards this. If we'd been killing 40,000-50,000 [Russian troops] a month back in 2022, maybe the idiots would now be running a bit low."
More details: Veres said the Unmanned Systems Forces currently account for 10-15% of total Russian military fatalities.
Quote: "We're holding that level, give or take 10-15%. This is a historic moment."
Background: In January, former Ukrainian defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov said that one of Ukraine's strategic goals is to inflict up to 50,000 casualties on Russian forces each month to make the war unsustainable for Russia.

In the South, Ukraine Has Rolled Back A Year Of Russian Advances

2026-08-16T07:32:26.885-04:00

The Ukrainians' 'quiet offensive' as it is being called, has pushed the Russians back over 750 kilometers in the south, undoing years' worth of gains, primarily in the southern oblasts.

The implication is that Russia no longer has the troops or equipment to hold what they've taken, let along grab much more, while the Ukrainians are controlling the place and tempo of the fighting. JL

Michael Obelcz reports in Malcontent News:

Russia has struggled to maintain momentum during its summer offensive, despite Ukraine suffering manpower shortages. Almost all of the Russian advances over the last 12 months in Dnipropetrovsk and southwestern Donetsk have been rolled back since Ukraine started its offensive. Kyiv was maintaining tight operational security while local area Russian commanders were attempting to conceal the deteriorating situation through a series of false capture claims. Small groups of Russian troops dressed as civilians tried to advance past the line of contact, to briefly wave flags for drones flying overhead. The Russian groups made one-way trips. Some were captured, others eliminated by drone strikes and close combat. For now, the initiative belongs to Ukraine.
After months of tight operational security, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine confirmed major advances in the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, and Zaporizhzhia regions, including the liberation of 26 settlements. The announcement was made after Russian sources published videos showing Ukrainian forces had crossed the Mokri Yaly River near Komar and advanced to Rybne in the Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
“From January through August of this year, our warriors of the Airborne Assault Forces and other units carried out an effective offensive operation in the Oleksandrivskyi sector,” Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. “Over the course of the operation, 745 square kilometers of territory were liberated. Twenty-six villages in the Dnipro, Donetsk, and Zaporizhzhia regions were returned to Ukrainian control.”
The announcement reveals a major improvement in the operational situation compared to the beginning of 2026, when Russian forces were advancing toward Pokrovske [Not to be confused with Pokrovsk in the Donetsk Oblast - Ed.], reaching the Haichur River at Andriivka. They also had a significant presence in Ivanivka and Novopavlivka in the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, and had infiltrated as far north as the Vovcha River at Orestopil and Novoselivka, and as far west as Iskara [Soviet name of Andriivka-Klevtsove - Ed.].
To support the announced advances, Ukraine released videos showing their forces freely moving in Yalta, Myrne, Voskresenka, Novomykolaivka, Krasnohirske, Rybne, Vyshneve, and Pryvillya. Recent Russian videos revealed Ukrainian soldiers were operating in Zirka, Maliivka, Berezove, and the critical high ground north of Solodke.

In late January, Ukraine started a localized tactical offensive, which accelerated after SpaceX blocked Russian access to Starlink on February 4. By the end of May, Russian forces were pushed back 15 kilometers from Pokrovske and were cleared from Ivanivka and Novopavlivka. Ukraine had also advanced on a wide front through Dnipropetrovsk, almost reaching the Zaporizhzhia Oblast border.
Settlements liberated by Ukrainian forces since January 1, 2026, in the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast. Base map copyright Google Maps, analysis by WBHG News - August 12, 2026.
Our analysts determined that 710.6 sqare kilometers of territory that was under Russian control or contested has been cleared by Ukrainian forces. That includes the liberation of 24 settlements since July 1. This closely aligns with the announcement made by Kyiv.
Settlements liberated by Ukrainian forces since January 1, 2026, in the southwestern part of the Donetsk Oblast. Base map copyright Google Maps, analysis by WBHG News - August 12, 2026.
Last month, Ukrainian forces established a bridgehead over the Mokryi Yaly River at Zirka, and have since advanced to the northern outskirts of occupied Komar. Velyka Novosilka, a critical Russian logistics hub and drone operations base, is now 15 kilometers from the line of contact (LOC), putting it within the so-called “kill zone” for Ukrainian drone operators.
Russia has struggled to maintain momentum during its summer offensive, despite Ukraine suffering manpower shortages. Almost all of the Russian advances over the last 12 months in Dnipropetrovsk and southwestern Donetsk have been rolled back since Ukraine started its offensive.
Until recently, neither Russia nor Ukraine had released a lot of information in this area. Kyiv was maintaining tight operational security while local area Russian commanders were attempting to conceal the deteriorating situation through a series of false capture claims. Small groups of Russian troops dressed as civilians used terrain to advance as far as 15 kilometers past the line of contact (LOC), to briefly wave flags for drones flying overhead. The Russian sabotage and reconnaissance groups made one-way trips. Some were captured, while others were eliminated by drone strikes and in close combat.
Ukrainian advances cut off a key Russian supply line
In the Zaporizhzhia Oblast, Russia’s offensive at Hulaiipole was supported by two supply lines. The first is south of the city from Kamianka, and the second was from the northeast at Velyka Novosilka. In April, Ukrainian forces were within 1,000 meters of the Velyka-Novosilka Road, essentially severing the northern route.
The Ukrainian advance has also reached the outskirts of another critical Russian logistic hub at Uspenivka. Located in a river valley west of the Yanchur River, its capture enabled Russia to start its Huliaipole offensive in the fall of 2025. Recent videos published by Ukrainian drone units show that Uspenivka and the surrounding settlements are now under fire control.
Further south, only one group of Russian forces has been geolocated beyond the railroad grade that passes west of Huliaipole since mid-July. The Ukrainian offensive to the north, combined with other issues, has brought the Russian offensive at Huliaipole to a halt.
What’s next
Russia forces have not been able to stabilize their defensive lines, and with Ukraine establishing a bridgehead over the Mokri Yaly River, Komar can be attacked in two directions. Liberating Komar provides Ukraine with defensible terrain for the winter while expanding the bridgehead.
In April, we assessed that the liberation of Uspenivka and the surrounding settlements was an operational goal for Ukraine, but it would require setting the right conditions.
Current line of contact in the area of occupied Uspenivka, a critical logistics hub captured by Russia in 2025. Base map copyright Google Maps, analysis by WBHG News - August 12, 2026.
Located in a shallow river valley about 100 meters below the surround terrain, advancing into the settlement without taking the high ground from the west and east first would put Ukrainian forces in a kill box.
To set conditions, Ukraine needs to liberate Solodke and the 195-meter-high hill just south of the village. Northeast of Uspenivka, Ukraine needs to advance south of Temyrivka, which is still under Russian control, to the 210-meter heights. Russian forces also control a farm complex south of Novohryhorivka, which is closer to Uspenivka. From the high ground south of Temyrivka, Ukrainian forces could advance west toward Uspenivka or east toward Velyka Novosilka.
Currently, Ukraine holds the 176-meter hill northwest of Solodke, and the village itself is contested. They also hold static defenses about 1,500 meters west of Solodke. To the east, Kyiv claimed that Novohryhorivka is under Ukrainian control, while Russia has offered stiff resistance south of Ternove since April.
With a wave of new Russian videos showing Ukrainian forces have advanced to Rybne, Myrne, Zirka, and Yalta within the last week, Russian area commanders have started to publicly acknowledge the Ukrainian advance.
In the short-term, Russia’s options are somewhat limited. The VKS (Russian Aerospace Forces) is conducting about 270 airstrikes per day and recently deprioritized the Huliaipole area. Currently, Moscow is prioritizing the northeastern part of Donetsk and setting conditions for an offensive on Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. In order to increase airstrikes along the Mokri Yaly, the VKS will have to reduce airstrikes somewhere else.
Although the Russian offensive at Huliaipole has been halted, the deployed troops have not been drawn down. Our analyst team has noted significant chatter in closed Telegram groups about logistical problems, including fuel, ammunition, and first-person view drone shortages. Russia could redeploy some of the forces on the western outskirts of Huliaipole north, but the terrain is very unfavorable, and it doesn’t solve the supply problems.
For now, the initiative belongs to Ukraine, and Russia has an additional problem. Due to operational security, today’s announcement and videos did not reveal the full extent of Ukraine’s advances.