ok what the fuck is happening in ukraine

From a good BBC study, tracking some of the grain:

"They take grain to the annexed Crimea first, where they transport it to Kerch or Sevastopol [ports], then they load Ukrainian grain on Russian ships and go to the Kerch Strait," says Andrii Klymenko, an expert at the Institute for Black Sea Strategic Studies in Kyiv, who regularly monitors movements of ships around Crimea.

"There, in the Kerch Strait [between Crimea and Russia], they transfer Ukrainian grain from small ships on to bulk carriers, where it is mixed with grain from Russia - or in some cases, they sail to this area just to give the appearance they are loading up with Russian grain."

He adds this is then exported with Russian certificates, saying that it's Russian grain.
Ships have then often headed on to Syria or Turkey.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has said they have investigated claims about Ukrainian grain being shipped to Turkey and so far not found any evidence.

"We saw that the ships' port of departure and the origin of the goods is Russia on the records," he said.

...The BBC has also obtained documents drawn up by the Russian occupying authorities listing farms where grain is to be transferred to them.

A separate investigation by BBC Russian and BBC Ukrainian has shown that in some cases, the Russians are forcing Ukrainian farmers to sell grain at prices well below market rates, and sign documents to prove it was purchased "legally".

While early reports were typically of outright theft by Russian forces, farmers suggest there has been a change in tactics as the Russians realise that if they pay nothing, future harvests could be sabotaged. The farmers say they have to accept the low prices as they have no alternative and need to buy fuel and pay workers.

Uh-oh, the same post you linked! Deservedly so, though.

Latest I've seen on this:

A Russian missile strike on a crowded mall in the central Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk killed at least 16 people, the head of emergency services said early Tuesday, sparking international outrage.
“The Russian strike today on the shopping centre in Kremenchuk is one of the most brazen terrorist acts in European history,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening broadcast posted on Telegram.
Emergency services chief Sergiy Kruk said the main tasks were “rescue work, debris removal and the elimination of fires” following Monday’s strike on the shopping centre.
“As of now, we know of 16 dead and 59 wounded, 25 of them hospitalised. The information is being updated,” Kruk said on Telegram.

“All response groups are working in intense mode,” he said. “The work will go on around the clock.”
“I would like to stress once again: do not neglect air alerts!”
Ukraine: ‘Help end the war by winter’, Zelensky urges leaders
27 Jun 2022

Earlier, Zelensky had said “over a thousand civilians” were in the mall when the missiles struck the city, which had a pre-war population of 220,000 people.
“The mall is on fire, rescuers are fighting the fire. The number of victims is impossible to imagine,” Zelensky wrote on Facebook.
...The Ukrainian defence ministry said the strike was deliberately timed to coincide with the mall’s busiest hours and cause the maximum number of casualties.
The Ukrainian air force said the mall was hit by Kh-22 anti-ship missiles fired from Tu-22 bombers in western Russia’s Kursk region.
...“The missile fire on Kremenchuk struck a very busy area which had no link to the hostilities,” the city’s mayor Vitali Maletsky wrote on Facebook.

update, more details:

he Russian Defence Ministry claimed a strike on an arms storage facility detonated ammunition which set the shopping centre on fire.

"Western-manufactured weapons and ammunition stockpiled in the warehouse to be sent to a Ukrainian military grouping in Donbas were hit with a high-precision strike," the ministry said.

Ukrainian officials have denied there was a weapons depot nearby.

CCTV footage captured near a pond roughly 600 metres north of the shopping centre, on the other side of a factory building, shows two missile strikes in the area.
Matching the exact spots where the two missiles land in the CCTV video with aerial images of the area, it appears one missile hit close to the eastern end of the shopping centre, while the other struck the northern end of the factory, near the southern edge of the pond. Satellite images of the area provide further evidence that these were the locations of the strikes.

The factory mentioned by the Russian defence ministry is located roughly 300 metres north of the shopping centre. The buildings are separated by a wall, vegetation and rail tracks, making the claim that "secondary explosions" caused a large fire with multiple casualties in the shopping centre unlikely.

According to the Ukrainian online publication Kyiv Independent, a press officer of the regional administration confirmed that the machinery plant had been hit, injuring two individuals.

Svitlana Rybalko, from the regional State Emergency Service, denied there were weapons stored at the facility."It's a place for making road equipment, machines for road construction," she told the BBC. "There's also a greenhouse nearby where workers grow cucumbers."

Meantime, Turkey got what it wanted out of Sweden/Finland for NATO accession and by all accounts Ukraine's been merrily blowing up ammo dumps well behind the lines, so.

I hope that the Russian oil price cap works and that Yellen gets credit. It seems very plausible and a good case for the things that seem to matter to economists (her peers).

Russian pundit perfectly sums up the SMO - “We failed to plan properly. Our goals turned out to be overestimated. Our calculations turned out to be incorrect. Our tactic turned out to be idiotic.” https://t.co/75m3vWisc1

— Dmitri 🇺🇦 (@mdmitri91) July 1, 2022

Oops...

And yet, as a despotic petrostate and charter member of the nuclear club, they can survive massive blunders that would destroy the governments of most nations.

Another good thread but this detail in particular, what in the world.

Even their soldiers are getting older. As Putin is terrified of bringing the realities of war to his people. The Duma just passed a bill raising the age for military service to 65! This is Volksturm WWII levels of desperation.https://t.co/bgosQ5STQw

— Phillips P. OBrien (@PhillipsPOBrien) July 3, 2022

Good article on the new HIMARS rocket systems being deployed by Ukraine:

https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/14/europe/ukraine-western-weapons-russia-front-lines-intl-cmd/index.html

"900 civilian bodies had been discovered in the Kyiv region after the withdrawal of Russian forces (p. 38). According to the police, nearly 95 percent were “simply executed”

http://osce.usmission.gov/response-to-moscow-mechanism-report-on-ukraine/

In the prison offices, officials hung portraits of Stalin and two chiefs of his secret police, Genrikh Yagoda and Lavrenti P. Beria. In Vladimir V. Putin’s Russia, the reputations of the men, who played major roles in purges of Stalin’s opponents, are being rehabilitated.

http://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/11/world/europe/ukraine-medic-russia-captive.html

Russian banks stand to benefit: VTB, VEB, Promsvyaz, Bank Rossiya, Sovcombank, Otkritie, among others. EU to soften sanctions on Russian banks to allow food and fertilizer trade https://t.co/R76eTMJS3s

— Elina Ribakova 🇺🇦 (@elinaribakova) July 19, 2022

Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion, export of grain and other cargo from seaports has been blocked by Russian troops. Exceptions have been three ports on the Danube River – Reni, Izmail, and Ust-Dunaisk.

During the temporary occupation of Snake Island, ships could not pass through the mouth of the Bystre by sailing along the Danube-Black Sea channel, so all ships used the Romanian Sulina Channel.

http://www.kyivpost.com/ukraine-politics/liberation-of-snake-island-partially-unlocks-grain-exports.html

Danube's delta right now. Ships loading grain at Izmail, Ukraine's port on the Danube. Taking Snake Island has made a difference. H/t Danail Glishev pic.twitter.com/3hkEBgPR1X

— Dimitar Bechev (@DimitarBechev) July 12, 2022

Ukraine says with new offensive, it can reclaim territory lost to Russia — but is that realistic?

For the last six weeks, piecemeal Ukrainian assaults have chipped away at Russian-held territory in the country's south, allowing its soldiers to get within 20 kilometres of Kherson.

"Forty-four settlements have already been liberated in Kherson Oblast," Dmytro Butriy, the acting head of the region's military administration, told an online news conference in Kyiv on Thursday.

"The situation there is difficult," he continued, claiming the destruction from Russian shelling is "massive" and that homes, schools and many other buildings have been damaged.
But whether that's as far as the counter-offensive gets and how much force Ukraine's military can muster after weeks of bruising fighting in the southeastern Donbas region remains unclear.

Retired Ukrainian colonel Serhiy Grabsky argues that the fate of Russian President Vladimir Putin's war hinges on his military holding Kherson — and of Ukraine being able to pry it away.

"That location will open the door for the liberation of all of the country and the termination of all of Russia's strategic goals," said Grabsky, who served in several international roles over a 28-year career, including as a military adviser to the Iraqi government.

He said pushing Russia out of Kherson would end any threat to Ukrainian cities, such as Mykolaiv and Odesa, and put Russian military installations in the Crimean Peninsula within reach of Ukraine's new Western weaponry — including long-range American HIMARS rocket launchers.

One of my favourite reddit subreddits is r/noncredibledefence. Not just because it has anime portraits of military leaders from history, such as Curtis LeMay, Bernard Montgomery, Karl Doenitz etc, drawn as if they were sexy anime ladies. And also fighter jets and guided missiles drawn as if they were also sexy anime ladies. It's really quite disconcerting to be attracted to a busty Norman Schwarzkopf or an AIM-9L Sidewinder and its "intense growling". Not just that, but also the subreddit has a surprisingly nuanced sense of dark comedy, which has been supercharged by the war in Ukraine.

On the positive side the war has lit a fuse under r/ncd and r/combatfootage and so forth, partially because it's an extraordinary conflict and partially because LiveLeak is defunct, so if you want to see people crawling out of burning tanks and plopping to the ground dead there aren't many places that collect that kind of footage. Syria produced a tonne of footage of exploding tanks, burning tanks, people with their legs shot off, close-up first-person kill shots, but they were fairly rare and the video quality was low. The war in Ukraine however has been fought in full HD, with Gopros and drones etc. On the negative side there's a tonne of spam, and because a lot of the videos are hosted by TikTok they are apparently required to have music (I'm not an expert on TikTok), and they all have masses of wobbly logos on them to stop people reusing the footage.

That was a mistake made by the "side view of Russian helicopter shot down with MANPAD" video that did the rounds a while back. There was no logo. A lot of the content is repetitive, because war is often boring, but this will stick with me:
https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/va4z8v/warfare_2022_ukrainian_troops_launch_a_drone_from/

It's a bunch of kids on the back of a moving armoured personnel carrier launching a drone, while wearing a first-person headset, using what looks like a gamepad, only it's actually happening. It's a real-life cartoon. This is the first war where all the participants were aware of anime and prepared to work together to make anime stereotypes real. Teenage kids fighting metal war machines with high technology.

Obviously drones have been a thing since at least Vietnam, and during Afghanistan and Iraq the narrative was that they were impersonal killing machines that left NATO pilots traumatised, but this war is being fought with spider-like backpack drones launched from the next trench along, operated by 18-year-olds who are on TikTok and can upload footage immediately, because Ukraine still has mobile phone reception. It's also the first war where people can track NATO AWACS aircraft doing circuits of the black sea with FlightRadar.

It will be used as material for war college studies and university dissertations ("in this post I will cover the intersectionality of TikTok and modern infantry combat") forever.

good post Ashley

because Ukraine still has mobile phone reception

If I recall correctly, Russia has done little to damage this infrastructure because they also rely on the same coverage network which is just crazy to me

An update on the "foreign legion" after 5 months of fighting in increasingly hellish conditions:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/ukraine-russia-foreign-soldiers-invasion-morale-us-veterans-rcna39268

It's a real-life cartoon. This is the first war where all the participants were aware of anime and prepared to work together to make anime stereotypes real. Teenage kids fighting metal war machines with high technology.

just want to go on record here that while this is true it also a description of hell and not a cool thing.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's dismissal of senior officials is casting an inconvenient light on an issue that the Biden administration has largely ignored since the outbreak of war with Russia: Ukraine's history of rampant corruption and shaky governance.

As it presses ahead with providing tens of billions of dollars in military, economic and direct financial support aid to Ukraine and encourages its allies to do the same, the Biden administration is now once again grappling with longstanding worries about Ukraine's suitability as a recipient of massive infusions of American aid.

Those issues, which date back decades and were not an insignificant part of former President Donald Trump's first impeachment, had been largely pushed to the back burner in the immediate run-up to Russia's invasion and during the first months of the conflict as the U.S. and its partners rallied to Ukraine's defense.

But Zelenskyy's weekend firings of his top prosecutor, intelligence chief and other senior officials have resurfaced those concerns and may have inadvertently given fresh attention to allegations of high-level corruption in Kyiv made by one outspoken U.S. lawmaker.

I like how it takes them till paragraph 16 of that story before identifying the "outspoken U.S. lawmaker," and it's

Rep. Victoria Spartz, a first-term Republican from Indiana

Spartz is a fucking psychopath with absolutely nothing of value to contribute to any discussion.

Watch below an excerpt from the @JudiciaryGOP committee hearing where I discuss my constitutional duty to protect people's rights to life, liberty and property, and the ever increasing infringements on our rights. pic.twitter.com/5TBcrHwxvI

— Rep. Victoria Spartz (@RepSpartz) July 22, 2022

http://www.lareviewofbooks.org/short-takes/leo-tolstoy-square-street-and-metro-station/

Many streets, squares, and monuments have been decommunized since 2014. However, due to certain cultural reflexes, Ukrainians have mostly held that art, if it had no direct connection to the glorification of terror, should not be touched, even if the amount of art from one foreign culture is much higher than that of all others combined. Therefore, Ukrainians have not been very bold re-namers, for example, of places named after Leo Tolstoy. Today in Kyiv we have the Leo Tolstoy metro station, Leo Tolstoy Square, and Leo Tolstoy Street. So what? What’s wrong with “friendship of peoples”? The answer is that it’s one of the fundamental Soviet concepts, which supposedly provided cultural exchange between “fraternal” republics like Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, and so on. But this exchange was largely unilateral: a small percentage of said “small peoples” were honored while Russians, representatives of the “great culture,” dominated.

@dow

re: corruption, you might find this interesting.

http://kyivindependent.com/national/rumors-of-zelensky-stripping-top-oligarch-kolomoiskys-citizenship-gain-ground

Despite not being the first people to lose citizenship via presidential decree, Kolomoisky, Korban and Rabinovich would be the most high-profile people to fall under such a procedure.

Kolomoisky is one of Ukraine’s best-known oligarchs. His business interests were wide-ranging, including oil and gas, metallurgy, mass media, and most infamously, banking and finance.

http://www.post-gazette.com/news/crime-courts/2022/07/24/oligarch-ihor-kolomoisky-stripped-ukraine-citizenship/stories/202207230047

The order by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could potentially open the way for prosecutors to move for extradition against the billionaire -- the target of a federal grand jury investigation -- in one of the largest money-laundering cases of its kind.

"They are taking serious measures," said John Herbst, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. "It may be a response to this latest expression of concern about corruption in Ukraine.

Mr. Zelenskyy’s order in the midst of the war with Russia comes after years of legal battles by prosecutors to seize U.S. properties they say the oligarch and his partners bought with money stolen from his former bank -- the losses large enough to cripple the country's economy -- and moved into the United States between 2008 and 2015.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jul/23/ukraine-oligarchs-russia-war-influence

The war has seemingly enabled Zelenskiy to become the first Ukrainian president to sideline the oligarchs, who have traditionally competed to control the country’s political leadership.

But analysts say that only once the war is over will it be clear if Ukraine’s oligarchic era has ended or if the oligarchs will try to regain their influence.

“Right now, the priority for oligarchs is not politics but ensuring the survival of their businesses and minimising their losses,” said Volodymyr Fesenko, a Ukrainian political analyst. “The only exception is [Ukraine’s previous president Petro] Poroshenko, who is still trying to be involved in politics,” said Fesenko.

http://ukranews.com/en/news/870969-border-guards-take-ukrainian-passport-from-korban-and-do-not-allow-him-into-ukraine-media

Also on July 21, Member of Parliament from [opposition party] Batkivschyna Serhii Vlasenko published a screenshot of the decree of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy, which indicates the deprivation of citizenship of Ukraine of several people, including oligarch Ihor Kolomoiskyi, MP from the Opposition Platform - For Life Vadym Rabinovych and the head of the territorial defense of Dnipropetrovsk region, businessman Hennadii Korban.

How much do i need to know to understand the legitimacy of citizenship stripping vs only charging them with crimes. Or both.

From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article:

For years, Mr. Kolomoisky was safe in his native country because there’s no extradition treaty between the United States and Ukraine. But without citizenship, he’s open to being taken into custody and sent to the U.S.

Strangely, out of all of them the Pittsburgh article is the most detailed, but I think I can see why:

In Ohio, Mr. Kolomoisky and his partners purchased a factory in Warren, but over time it was plagued with dangerous breakdowns after workers said the owners failed to invest in safety and to clean up rampant hazardous waste violations. Two explosions inside the plant left some workers badly injured and disabled, records and interviews show.

In Illinois, Mr. Kolomoisky and his partners bought a shuttered cell phone factory, pledging to find tenants and create jobs. And ultimately, they stopped paying the taxes and the utility bills, owing hundreds of thousands of dollars.

They shuttered the Warren Steel plant in 2016, owing millions in utility bills and to local businesses, while leaving 162 workers without jobs.

"This destroyed my life," said Brian Shaffer, who was left disabled from injuries during a blast in 2010. "We put all we had into that place, and they left us with nothing."

Apparently the citizenship stripping question comes down to a peculiar aspect of Ukrainian law, which prohibits things like 'dual citizenship' but does not automatically strip you of Ukrainian citizenship should you become a citizen of a foreign country. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A dispute has emerged over whether the president can draw on legislative authority to strip people of their naturalization, or whether the constitution prohibits it.

Though the president's order will likely gain international support in some countries, any move by Ukraine authorities to take the oligarch into custody and deliver him to U.S. law enforcement will be challenged, he said.

Despite any legal efforts by Mr. Kolomoisky, who has filed hundreds of lawsuits to gain control of his former bank, the president's order is critical in letting the world know where he stands, said Kenneth McCallion, a former federal prosecutor who once represented former Ukraine Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

It will "break the stranglehold that the oligarchs such as Kolomoisky have had over politics and the economy," he said. "Zelensky and his advisers have finally come to the realization that even if they can successfully fend off the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the victory will be a pyrrhic one unless the country can function as a true democracy, rather than an oligarchy with only the trappings of democratic structures."

TY. what a fucked up situation.

This thread is amazing and hilarious

Today FSB announced that they have “foiled a plot by Ukraine’s intelligence services” to lure Russian military pilots to surrender to Ukraine – with their planes – in return for millions of USD in payments (thread).

— Christo Grozev (@christogrozev) July 25, 2022

Such tactics violate international humanitarian law and endanger civilians, as they turn civilian objects into military targets 👇https://t.co/EysZtcqqci

— Amnesty International (@amnesty) August 4, 2022

ISTANBUL (AP) — Three more ships carrying thousands of tons of corn left Ukrainian ports Friday and traveled mined waters toward inspection of their delayed cargo, a sign that an international deal to export grain held up since Russia invaded Ukraine was slowly progressing. But major hurdles lie ahead to get food to the countries that need it most.

corn kid made this happen

🤪 @ not caring whether weapons get into the wrong hands!

The new CBS Reports documentary, "Arming Ukraine," explores why much of the billions of dollars of military aid that the U.S. is sending to Ukraine doesn't make it to the front lines: "Like 30% of it reaches its final destination." Stream now: https://t.co/Ob7Y3EsWkn pic.twitter.com/YgVbpYZkHn

— CBS News (@CBSNews) August 5, 2022

Although this tweet and the one it's retweeting make good points

Amnesty has no authority in weapon tracking. What the actual hell is going on??? https://t.co/NYNL7qB1Wv

— Nika Melkozerova (@NikaMelkozerova) August 6, 2022

There’s a lot of criticism of the Amnesty report from other accounts too. I thought Amnesty was all about political prisoners? At least it was when I was a member in the early 90s.

Yeah it is weird that an Amnesty guy is suddenly concerned about weapons trafficking.

didn't the head of Amnesty in Ukraine resign over this?

https://www.reuters.com/world/head-ukraines-amnesty-office-leaves-after-group-accuses-kyiv-2022-08-06/

The UN nuclear watchdog has called for an immediate end to all military action near Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant after it was hit by shelling, causing one of the reactors to shut down and creating a “very real risk of a nuclear disaster”.

There’s a statement from the head of the org that mentioned a 30% figure here:

The @CBSNews report was filmed 8 weeks into the war. Things have changed. ANY info to be misused by certain entities in an antiUkraine context while a genocidal war is being perpetrated on #Ukraine by Russia in a terrorist state fashion, is evil & puts blood on their hands. pic.twitter.com/bfwvBYPHfB

— Blue Yellow for Ukraine 🇱🇹🇺🇸🇺🇦 (@BlueYellowUKR) August 6, 2022

This is a good thread on the CBS thing, which mirrors a lot of what was said about the earlier Amnesty report.

It is at best, deeply irresponsible for CBS and Amnesty to make these claims without rigorous evidence. This mirrors a lot of unsupported rumor I hear primarily from those without a background on Ukraine. https://t.co/JC2NdhGmVd

— Jack Margolin (@Jack_Mrgln) August 6, 2022

Allegations of misuse of supplies / breaches of international law should be published, even / especially in the middle of a war but they need to be rigorously researched, tightly reported, have that reporting communicated in a responsible way and have a plan in place for countering malign propaganda misinterpretation and misuse. CBS and, more importantly Amnesty, have fallen short at every stage.

Amnesty does have an important role to play in outlining how weapons from one region / conflict show up to fuel other unrelated ones but Rovera’s contribution here is mystifying.

You know, only about 30% of their reporting makes to air. Nobody knows where any of their news is going. https://t.co/ySLQPghS3O

— SK Media🇺🇦🌻 (@SpaghettiKozak) August 8, 2022

It's good to see that guns are not falling into the wrong hands.

Just going through this on the Ukraine/Russian grain deal. Seems good.

https://www.crisisgroup.org/europe-central-asia/eastern-europe/ukraine/who-are-winners-black-sea-grain-deal

Sat down for another discussion on the course of the war with Ryan Evans. We discuss the possibility of an inflection point in the conflict, the shift of focus to the south, and Russia's continued manpower woes. Tune in if interested. @WarOnTheRocks https://t.co/P7seYerIsG

— Michael Kofman (@KofmanMichael) August 8, 2022

Trade union and human rights activist Pavel Lisyansky explains why Russia's presence in the Donbas has proved a disaster for the labor movement, and why defending human and labor rights sometimes goes hand in hand https://t.co/eMxVpRdCo9

— European Network in Solidarity with Ukraine (@EuropeanWith) August 7, 2022

Article describing how Ukrainian industries are faring as the war goes on: agriculture, steel, distilleries, and more.

http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2022-russia-war-impact-ukraine-global-trade-goals/?srnd=premium-europe

Kubrakov added capacity at existing border posts and is opening two new crossings on Ukraine’s frontiers with both Poland and Romania. Last month, he negotiated a deal with the EU so truckers only have to clear customs once. A second ferry went into operation across the Danube to carry more grain to the Romanian port of Constanta, and fuel back.

A defunct railway line through Moldova is also being reopened to feed traffic, while the river port of Reni - all but abandoned after the 1991 Soviet collapse - has returned to its 11 million metric ton per year capacity, from just 200,000 tons before the war, according to Kubrakov.

That’s got Ukraine’s exports to about 30% of what they were, and there’s more to come, said Kubrakov. Yet it’s nowhere near enough to get the economy out of intensive care, and time may not be on Ukraine’s side.

Much more in there...

⚡️ Russia is using a nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine as an army base. The allegations we are receiving directly from Enerhodar, the town adjacent to the nuclear plant, speak volumes about the terrible impact of Russia’s militarization is having on civilians.

— Amnesty International (@amnesty) August 11, 2022

LITTLE SIGN OF KHERSON OFFENSIVE: There’s little sign yet on the outskirts of the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson of an imminent counteroffensive.

“[I]n trenches less than a mile from Russia’s positions in the area, Ukrainian soldiers hunker down from an escalating onslaught of artillery, with little ability to advance,” The Washington Post’s LOVEDAY MORRIS, LIZ SLY, DALTON BENNETT and ANASTACIA GALOUCHKA reported. “Residents who have fled villages in the Kherson region have described Russian forces moving in reinforcements, and officials have eyed those troop movements warily.”

“They’ve dug in,” OLEKSANDR VILKUL, head of the military administration in Kryvyi Rih, told the Post. “We know that they are trying to fortify their positions. The enemy has significantly increased its artillery along the entire [60-mile front] line.”

The Ukrainians lack the requisite artillery and armored vehicles needed to make a push, per the Post, giving Russian forces the chance to regroup and build up, while Kyiv struggles to pay its soldiers due to slowly arriving Western funds .

NatSec Daily wants to know: Is the Kherson counteroffensive a ruse, perhaps intended to divert Russia’s attention away from Ukraine's east? Likely not, but we’ve been wondering why Kyiv has so loudly telegraphed its intentions.

KEEP A LID ON IT: Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY cautioned the country's defense officials against speaking to the press amid fears they may be leaking military tactics in their fight against Russia, The Guardian reported.

"If you want to generate loud headlines, that’s one thing — it’s frankly irresponsible. If you want victory for Ukraine, that is another thing, and you should be aware of your responsibility for every word you say about our state’s plans for defense or counter attacks," Zelenskyy said.

The warning came as two Ukrainian officials told POLITICO that Ukraine was responsible for an attack on a Russian airbase in Crimea. The Kremlin claims that explosions were the result of accidentally detonated munitions while Ukraine's defense ministry denied responsibility for the blasts.

U.S. and UN officials have been concerned by recent fighting near nuclear facilities, prompting Russia to reject calls for a demilitarized zone near a Ukrainian nuclear facility.

EVACUATION FROM NEAR NUCLEAR PLANT: Fears of a radiation leak at the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant led Ukrainian officials to plan for evacuations of nearby residents.

“The power plant is not just in enemy hands, but in the hands of untrained specialists who can cause a tragedy,” Ukrainian Interior Minister DENYS MONASTYRSKYI told The Wall Street Journal’s YAROSLAV TROFIMOV , adding that the access of Ukrainian personnel has been restricted in some areas. “The level of danger is the highest. It’s hard to even imagine the scale of the tragedy if Russian activities continue there. We have to prepare for all scenarios now.”

Concerns are mounting about the fate of Europe’s largest nuclear plant, equipped with six reactors. Russia rejected a United Nations plea to demilitarize the area around Zaporizhzhia as the facility gets rocked with more shelling . Both Ukraine and Russia accuse each other of striking the plant.

Interesting series of threads about a 140-page first-person account, originally published on the Russian equivalent of Facebook, written by a contract paratrooper who was part of the initial Russian invasion force from the Crimea into Kherson. So far some unsurprising accounts of disorganization, shoddy or nonexistent equipment, and unsympathetic commanders:

1/ On 24 February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. This 🧵 highlights the first-person account of Russian paratrooper Pavel Filatyev, who was in the invasion force that entered Ukraine from Crimea, captured Kherson and unsuccessfully fought to reach Mykolaiv. pic.twitter.com/p4MYkaEmvM

— ChrisO (@ChrisO_wiki) August 18, 2022

Speaking of Crimea, BBC World Service now reporting new series of explosions there

http://anchor.fm/ukraine-without-hype/episodes/Episode-28-An-Injury-to-One-is-an-Injury-to-All-w-Vladyslav-Starodubtsev-e1mhvcb

There's a news update in the beginning which is easily skipped, but about 10-15 mins in, they start the discussion about the labor law changes:

Then, we speak with Vladyslav Starodubtsev, a Democratic Socialist activist in the organization Sotsialnyi Rukh, or Social Movement. We discuss the new changes to Ukraine's labor laws that severely hurt worker's rights in a time when maintaining stability is even more important than ever. What sacrifices are actually necessary and useful in war and who should bear them?

More on the labor laws and Ukraine's economic future:

http://www.greenleft.org.au/content/ukraines-recovery-must-benefit-people-west-has-other-ideas

As of April 1, roughly five million citizens applied for one-time income loss benefits — but as of the end of May, the registered number of unemployed people was 308,000, which is 16 times lower.

The main risks are that privatisation and reduction of civil servants may destroy protected jobs, and the newly created ones will be precarious. There is also a threat that infrastructure projects will simply enrich foreign corporations, and that the Ukrainian economy will retain its mostly extractive nature instead of developing new innovative industries.

Ukraine faces a colossal task in dealing with huge destruction and re-launching industry, but neoliberal policies are not suitable for this. A strategy based on government intervention in the economy and the financing of employment programs is needed. This, in turn, requires policies of redistribution through taxation and the confiscation of surplus wealth from Ukraine’s richest people. This would be a concrete expression of Ukraine’s long-promised policy of de-oligarchisation, which has, it seems, faded from the political agenda since the beginning of the war.