Notices by kravietz 🦇 (kravietz@agora.echelon.pl)

On 14 June 2014 #Russia shot down an #Ukraine Il-76 transport plane over #Luhansk killing all 49 soldiers.

Putin consistently claimed it maintains no military presence in Donbas and all fighting is done by “local self-defense” in spite of overwhelming evidence that Russia continuously transfers supplies and soldiers into Ukraine.

In slightly more than a month Russia will covertly transfer an advanced “Buk” SAM system to Donbas and shoot down the #MH17 civilian aircraft with it…

https://video.echelon.pl/w/6Hu4hFytqwFVMx9yAKNdqU

#Ukraine volunteer combat medic Rebekah Maciorowski describes her work today:

My nurse and I are constantly preparing medical packages to be delivered to our wounded soldiers via drone. I never imagined modern day combat medicine would look like this, but here we are.

It seems that the Russians have finally carried out their ‘retaliatory strike’ for the military airports. Oleg Tsaryev proudly lists the targets of Russian retaliation: the metro, petrol stations, post offices, power stations, etc. The Russian soul is at peace, the planes have been solidly avenged 🙏

#Russia Fighterbomber (he’s an actual retired military pilot) commented on today’s “retaliatory strike” in a very explicit post

If this was the maximum of our capabilities without using nuclear weapons, then we should stop fucking around and just use nuclear. Wipe out enemy’s towns one after another. For now, we seem to be capable to do this. Or we should at least stop saying ‘this was our response’.

In other words, Russian retired military expert running a channel with 500k+ subscribers admits that Russia - who calls itself a “superpower” and “second army in the world” - is unable to match military power of a country 3x smaller - which they call “country 404” and the only way to win the war for them is nuclear terror.

#Russia claims its aircrafts were exposed to #Ukraine attacks because it was the “requirement of the New START treaty”, once again presenting itself as a victim of “international conspiracy”. The specific claim is that the treaty required the aircrafts to be “exposed” for satellite inspection and thus could not have been kept in hangars.

Except Russia suspended its New START compliance in 2023 and is therefore not bound by any of its requirements, which is not surprising granted that it gives participating countries right to up to 18 in-person inspections per year.

Apart from this obvious lie, Russian aircrafts were attacked fueled, armed and loaded with Kh-101 weapons in preparation for upcoming attack on Ukraine, which makes them part of regular, conventional air force rather than “heavy bombers equipped for nuclear armaments” regulated by the treaty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_START

#Russia Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov:

Russia expects a “clear response” from the US and the UK on Ukraine’s recent attacks on its strategic bombers.“Kyiv’s actions are clearly aimed at further escalation.

In plain language: the aggressor is asking international community to protect its weapons of aggression from its victim, who’s fighting back.

Here’s one of the destroyed Tu-95 with Kh-101 cruise missile attached under its wing, which means it war prepared for imminent launch flight. Ukraine SBU literally saved another of its towns from being hit by Russians:

#Poland Internal Security Agency (ABW) discovered and secured several containers filled with MANPADS (air defense) weapons stored with no protection on a small private air club near #Ukraine border.

The weapons came out to be legally purchased by a private arms trading company and intended to be sent to Ukraine in due course, but the level of irresponsibility and stupidity of its owners here is rather shocking.

With the largest transport hub for Ukraine located nearby (Rzeszów-Jasionka), you don’t need much imagination to realise what could happen if these MANPADS were captured by some pro-Russian elements.

Source: https://infosecurity24.pl/bezpieczenstwo-wewnetrzne/przeciwlotnicza-bron-bez-nadzoru-przy-granicy-z-ukraina-nie-nalezala-do-polskiego-wojska (in Polish)

#Russia and #Ukraine agreed to continue negotiations in #Istanbul - that’s fascinating news, isn’t it?

Ukraine had just MASSIVELY violated Russia’s so called “red lines”, not one but several of them.

And Russia responded… no, not by using some doomsday weapons. They just sent a delegation which, as participants reported, was behaving almost like regular humans. And then they agreed on the next round!

The only people who were furious and panicked were our own Western “geopolitical experts” who historically always advised to always be kind to Russia, and always give it what it wants.

Can you see a pattern here?

#Russia “Lpr1” monitoring and alert channel writes:

• 13:16 - The attack on the Crimean Bridge continues. They are breaking through the barriers.
• 13:23 - Traffic on the Crimean Bridge is temporarily closed.
• 13:32 - The entire coast of Crimea. Prevention of BEK [naval drones] and underwater measures

Timestamps in 🇬🇧 GMT.

This article represent a niche but persistent trend of Western “experts” claiming that #Ukraine Operation Spiderweb was “too much”, because “Russia will respond” and such operations “will not stop Russia anyway”:

https://www.defensepriorities.org/opinion/drone-attack-may-do-ukraine-more-harm-than-good/

The ignorance of these claims stems from the belief that Russia is somehow constantly ‘refraining’ from ‘escalation’ as long as Ukraine defends itself ‘in a limited manner’, within some imaginary borders – e.g. ‘on its own territory, but not attacking Russia’ or ‘using X, but not Y’. The same tone can be seen in voices concerned about “response” and “escalation” each time Ukraine crosses another imaginary “red-line”.

As a reminder, on 25 May Russia attacked Ukraine with total 267 aerial weapons, from drones to cruise missiles, killing civilians and destroying dozens of civilian targets. The number was largest… in May, but it’s the daily routine for the whole country under fire.

First Russian rockets that killed civilians were fired on the very 24 February 2022. In response to various successful Ukrainian operations Russia already executed what they openly called “retaliatory strikes” (удары возмездия) on hospitals, power & heating plants, schools, museums or just residential houses.

If Russia had any legal or moral brakes, it would not have killed 13,000 Ukrainian civilians since 2022. If it had any resources for major escalation itself, it would not be desperately buying soldiers from North Korea to compensate for human losses of 20,000 to take a single village after a year of siege.

Russia does not need any legal or common-sense reason to escalate - Russia had been constantly escalating its aggression since 2014.

This whole “Western expert” argument therefore boils down to the sophism that ‘if Ukraine dares to resist, Russia will escalate.’ The problem is that Russia also does not have common-sense limits to “resistance” as we understand it. As a reminder, for Russians, the Ukrainian defensive fortifications built between 2014 and 2022 were ‘aggression.’

And ‘resistance’ for Russians is anything short of an enthusiastic acceptance of the occupation — even Ukrainians speaking Ukrainian is ‘resistance’ that must be suppressed! How do we know? This happening all the time on the occupied territories.

In other words, the whole argument of ‘don’t do X because they will escalate’ boils down to the fact that the only guarantee of ‘non-escalation’ is to forcefully bare your teeth and wave the Soviet flag while Russian soldiers rape and loot.

Only then, maybe, will they not ‘escalate’ by killing you. Maybe. But you must praise their rape efforts in proper Russian language, and thank them for ‘liberation’ all the time.

President Zelensky in evening speech:

In total 117 drones were used in “Spider web” operation. The office of the operation was next to FSB HQ in one of the Russian regions.

That’s giant slap on the face of the FSB, which is the party that actually runs the country in #Russia And everyone - army and FSB - know it’s absolutely true.

Case study how some #Ukraine channels create incendiary fakes, likely in order to boost their engagements:

11 May Ukraine’s ICRC channel with 3k subscribers publishes a short, routine post[^1] with an attached video documenting a story of a mother whose son disappeared in 2022:

As of April 2025, we have received 400,000 requests from families searching for their missing loved ones.

Please note the words they used - and those they didn’t use - because it’s important.

29 May the post is picked up by a Ukrainian channel “Хлопці з ППО | РАДАР” (Boys from air defense - radar) with ~180k subscribers. The channel is private, which is why I can only provide screenshot, not a link. Their post quotes ICRC but it broadcasts a dramatically different message:

400 thousands Ukrainian soldiers disappeared without trace - shocking data from ICRC for April.

This message spreads on other channels and media because, of course, it’s very controversial and shocking. Except it’s 100% false:

• ICRC did not say a word of “soldiers”, it was invented by the channel’s admin
• ICRC did not say a word of “Ukrainian soldiers”, it was also added
• ICRC did not even speak of missing people, their message talks about “requests”

30 May ICRC published a statement[^2] clarifying their original post where they explain that 400’000 is the total number of requests (emails, telephones, personal visits) from both sides (Ukraine and Russia) asking for help in locating their missing relatives. ICRC also added that the number of “open requests for search of persons” is 116’000, which is probably approximate number of people (see below) missing from both sides.

Now, because Russians are the aggressors in this war and they are mostly getting killed on the territory in Ukraine, it’s natural that their families contact Ukrainian Red Cross to locate them. Almost all “Russian persons missing in Ukraine” will be therefore Russian soldiers.

With Ukraine it’s completely different: thousands of Ukrainian civilians went missing as result of Russian bombing, occupation, filtration camps, arrests and forced deportations. And only then on top of that there’s also the Ukrainian soldiers who are missing because they were either killed or taken POW on the territories taken by Russians.

So any number published by ICRC cannot be interpreted exclusively as “missing Ukrainian soldiers”, especially when they publish only aggregated number for both countries.

More information about how ICRC CTA (Central Tracing Agency) operates can be also found on their website.[^3]

[^1]: https://t.me/ICRCinUkraine/1209

[^2]: https://t.me/ICRCinUkraine/1233

[^3]: https://www.icrc.org/en/document/central-tracing-agency-missing-persons-ukraine

This story has a strong Ernst Röhm vibe…

#Russia army major Zaur Gurtsiev, head of air force operation during “liberation” of #Mariupol - read: approved bombing of hospitals and the Dramatic Theatre - was killed when he met with a man from a gay dating app. The man was former policeman, by the way.

https://meduza.io/en/feature/2025/05/29/a-veteran-s-violent-end

Russia frequently highlights its opposition ot “LGBT ideology” and general gayness. Promotion of “non-traditional sexual relationships” is now officially a crime, and one frequently quoted reason for the war is to prevent homosexuality from spreading to #Ukraine from the West which is now 100% gay and decaying. Which doesn’t prevent Russian elites from keeping their children and wealth stashed in that decaying West, but let’s not be picky on formal logic. And then this West, all gay and soft, is planning a huge offensive on Russia, which Russia is defending from by attacking Ukraine. So yeah, that’s it.

Now, if you read the history of the Nazi Ernst Röhm, you will see plenty of parallels both between the man and the state:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_R%C3%B6hm

Everything you need to know about #Russia attacks “targeting exclusively military objects” in #Ukraine, as claimed by Peskov recently:

In the first quarter of 2025, the civilian mortality rate in Ukraine due to the Russian invasion increased by 59% compared to the same period in 2024, UN Deputy Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo said at the UN Security Council on May 29.

https://english.nv.ua/russian-war/ukraine-civilian-deaths-rise-59-in-q1-2025-un-report-50518146.html

#Germany economy minister urges Brussels to back support plan for heavy industry:

Germany’s new economy minister has warned that the survival of the country’s heavy industry is vital to Europe’s sovereignty, as she pleaded for Brussels to approve a plan to support German energy-intensive companies. Katherina Reiche said she was hopeful the European Commission understood the need for Berlin to subsidise electricity costs for sectors such as chemicals and steel to help end Germany’s longest postwar period of stagnation.

Minister Reiche is 100% right in her argument about sovereignty of European supply chains but her argument highlights a much deeper contradictions in the EU policy which had been historically largely pushed by Germany and European Greens: high costs of energy are direct result of EU emission policies, such as ETS.

The original purpose of these policies was to reduce CO2 emissions from emission intensive industries by their modernisation and innovation, but combined with zero import tariffs it has only resulted in virtual reduction by expelling these industries abroad, where energy is cheaper and where nobody cares about CO2. I’m truly puzzled by the blindness of those “environmentalists” who celebrate deindustrialisation of Europe as a win for environment, when the same products are now manufactured in Asia with zero concern about pollution or emissions, both of which don’t care about national borders.

So what Reiche says is correct but it needs to apply to all European energy and industry sectors, not just some selective subsidies for German companies only.

Source: https://archive.is/Zgk49

#Russia Taganrog - on the latest wave of rewriting history a memorial plaque dedicated to the victims of local #NKVD was replaced with one praising the executioners.

Dear #Russia troll spamming from various accounts under any thread on #Ukraine - you’d better not started this. Your linked a copy-paste article that mentions Ukrainian “war crimes”, for example:

The shooting of Mariupol by Ukrainian missiles: On January 24, 2015, a civilian housing estate of the city was shot from the AFU positions in the north and west of Mariupol from the MLRS.

The problem here is that 24 January 2015 Russian “Grad” shelling of #Mariupol was very well documented - many people took videos:

https://video.echelon.pl/w/qxnQZajn2GXJxaQbLxR3A7

Thanks to them it was possible to establish beyond any doubt who was firing and from where:

According to the impact analysis, the Grad rockets originated from a north-easterly direction, in the area of Oktyabr (19 km north-east of Olimpiiska Street), and the Uragan rockets from an easterly direction, in the area of Zaichenko (15 km east of Olimpiiska Street), both controlled by the “Donetsk People’s Republic” (“DPR”).

https://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/136061

As usual, Russians are giving out their own war crimes and blaming Ukraine for them, against all available evidence.

There’s a new incarnation of a fanatic Russian troll now using account @iseut@pol.social notoriously spamming discussions related to Ukraine with Russian propaganda. Please report all posts with report to pol.social so that they have a chance to block it.

#Russia territorial gains versus accumulated casualties. The territorial gains largely flattened after end of 2022 and were minimal since, while losses continue to increase.

#Russia railways loading has been dropping since 2022 but this years - the black line at the bottom - has been the worst for years. Railway loading is one of the proxies for general state of economy, especially in Russia whose industry heavily depends on railways. This chart comes from a video[^1] by a Polish railways expert Ryszard Piech.

But then pretty much the same thing is reported by a Russian VChK-OGPU channel which reports 8.6% cargo volumes in April against the last year. The channel report that RZhD (Russian Railways) are going through severe financial problems due to dropping cargo traffic and the short-term perspective is grim, as the company faces massive layoffs.