Malazan Empire: Werthead - Viewing Profile - Malazan Empire

The Russians have gone berserk and launched an absolutely massive series of attacks in the Shakhove area, which is held by 1st Azov Corps, including some of the biggest armoured attacks for at least two years. The Ukrainians have held fast and destroyed over sixty Russian armoured vehicles in the last three days.

The attack was a complete disaster. The Ukrainians saw the Russian forces gathering and hit muster points with everything they had, then blew all the bridges in the area, forcing Russian forces to stop and build pontoons. Barely any pontoons were completed before they were obliterated by drones. Russians attempted to gain local drone superiority but failed, and Ukraine pushed back the drone coverage to allow their own drones to hit the advancing Russian forces. A Grad and a Tornado artillery system were destroyed, and over 120 Russians confirmed KIA. Some sources saying it was three Grads destroyed. One Ukrainian soldier said it was the most unbelievably stupid attack he'd seen the Russians make since some of their dumbest moves near the start of the war.

In the last seven months, Russia lost 131,000 KIA and 93,000 wounded. Russia has only recruited around 221,000 troops in the same time period. Putin is reportedly considering asking North Korea for 30,000 more troops.

The first new-generation Russian Sarma multiple rocket launcher system has been confirmed destroyed in action.

The Antipinsky oil refinery in Tyumen, around 1,900 km from Ukraine, has taken a heavy series of Ukrainian drone strikes. Cargo ships transporting weapons and material from Iran to Russia (and possibly vice versa) have been hit on the Caspian Sea as well.

Almost 1500 Russian confirmed casualties yesterday, the highest total for months. Note the true figure is much higher than this, but a lot of casualties do not have filmed verification.

Ukrainian forces took command of a NATO flotilla during sea exercises, with Ukraine and NATO working on integrating their command structures and processes.

Ukraine has released a swathe of Ukrainian intelligence data on Russian-Iranian intelligence sharing to its NATO partners, including the United States. Ukraine claims that Russian imaging was used by Iran to coordinate strikes on American and allied bases in the Gulf.

As many as 8 Wildberries depots have now been struck and destroyed by Ukrainian drones or missiles. A depot in Yekaterinburg was the latest addition.

The President of Kazakhstan has proposed freezing the war on current lines for peace talks, to Putin's face during a public meeting. Putin did not seem thrilled.

Ukraine has initiated a strong counter-attack north of Lyman. It looks like this is an offensive designed to cut off Sandryholove, with fighting going on in Zelena Dolyna and Lypove.

Russia has been unable to sell bonds in its recent auctions. Russia needs 1.5 trillion rubles to cover its deficit and has only raised 10 billion from the bonds. Future sales of bonds has been suspended. Russia is either going to default on its existing bonds or have to inflate its currency massively, either of which would be a "suboptimal" outcome.

Ukraine has blitzed Belgorod city's fuel stations, destroying 20 stations, one-third of the total, in four days. This is in response to Russia's attacks on Ukrainian forecourt stations.

Ukraine claims to have hacked a Russian air defence system near Moscow and used it to shoot down an Su-57. This would be only the third Su-57 destroyed in the war.

About 10% of Russia's Wildberries capacity has been destroyed in under one week, causing major disruption to Russian military deliveries to the front (not to mention major annoyance for Russian civilians). Some reports tonight that a further Wildberries warehouse is now burning in Sevastopol.

A Buk-M3 SAM system has been destroyed in Donetsk Oblast.

Laura Loomer has interviewed Zelensky. Interesting to see how that turns out.

Dugin is now calling openly for mobilising another half-million or so Russian troops.

Major General Ihor Skybyuk will become Chief of the General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, apparently. I am not familiar past a google search. He seems competent and played a key role in the Kharkiv counteroffensive.

This is turning into a mess. Zelensky has offered to replace Syrskyi and give Fedorov another job in government. Fedorov has said he will only return to his previous position as defence minister. There has already been one big meeting over this and another one is happening now, since Zelensky knows this is a PR disaster and needs to be nipped in the bud quickly. The calculus now is whether backing down makes him look or weak or pragmatic.

ETA: Syrskyi out, Mykhailo Drapatyi in.

Ukraine launched huge overnight drone strikes. They've started targeting additional Wildberries (Russian Amazon, basically) distribution centres, since Russian soldiers are sourcing large amounts of survival gear, body armour, IR cameras etc through the service, enough that they can be classified as military logistics hubs. Since the start of the attacks, Wildberries employees have been finding excuses not to turn up to work. Three hubs have so far been hit, one heavily enough to be classified as effectively destroyed. A fuel depot at Pedosk and a substation at Yalta, Crimea were also destroyed, and a refinery in Tatarstan was damaged.

Fire Point has posted test footage of Ukrainian ballistic missiles undergoing testing.

3 tankers and 4 cargo ships were hit by Ukrainian drones on the Sea of Azov and Black Sea overnight.

A Russian Gerbara drone with live explosives was found on a beach in Turkey, suggesting it had come down over the sea and was washed ashore.

Zelensky may make major personnel shifts in the coming day or so, with Syrskyi's position apparently in question.

Bit of a random one to end the evening on. Laura Loomer has arrived in Ukraine and is touring the country. Apparently she has changed her mind and now says that aid to Ukraine is vital, and tougher sanctions are needed on Russia. Reportedly she got very annoyed at people calling her a Putin apologist and has now concluded that Ukraine needs to be supported until Russia is forced to withdraw.

There's been a mild shift in hardline right-wing American influencers now switching to supporting Ukraine in recent months. Possibly useful but odd.