Ukraine launches another massive drone attack on targets across Russia, including another strike on the oil depot at Engels, which had already been burning since a strike last week.
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Russian Telegram channels report drone attacks on 12 regions of Russia last night with about 200 drones
Restrictions were imposed at the airports of Kazan,Kaluga, Saratov,Tambov,Penza, Nizhnekamsk&Ulyanovsk,& emergency blackouts were introduced in one of the settlements of Russia's Belgorod region
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— Anton Gerashchenko (@antongerashchenko.bsky.social) January 14, 2025 at 3:05 AM
Predictable, Russian military bloggers are aghast that the mighty Russian air defense system seems incapable of stopping slow-moving drones that flew across Russia relatively unmolested.
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The Russians are struggling to comprehend why, in the third year of the war, their so-called superpower consistently fails to stop massive waves of Ukrainian drones and remains incapable of countering them effectively. They are now searching for someone to blame.
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— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated.bsky.social) January 14, 2025 at 6:57 AM
A massive drone strike on Russia-over 200 units. Widespread "debris falls" on industrial facilities. The score favors the adversary. This raises just one question for me: why does the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) General Staff even exist? What's its purpose? It conducts no air offensives, no operations to gain air superiority, and so on. A couple of divisional commanders would suffice to launch missile strikes and deliver FABs with guided bombs to targets. So what are the dozens of VKS generals doing? Writing paperwork?
……
Who is personally responsible for the country's air defense? I've said it before and will say it again: we are incredibly lucky that our air defense system is being stress-tested by the outdated and war-weary Ukrainian Air Force. If NATO's aviation group were in their place, the outcome would be devastating.
Glad I’m not on the receiving end of that barrage.
Oops.
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Forbes writes that a Russian UAV mistakenly destroyed a North Korean air defense system in the Kursk region.
This is an air defense system that is a modified version of the Russian Tor air defense system. This equipment is rare even for North Korea itself.
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— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated.bsky.social) January 14, 2025 at 6:11 AM
Ukraine hasn’t actually received one of these yet. There is a training period for operators and the first one Ukraine will actually get won’t be until April.
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Ukraine has officially received its first of 54 next-generation RCH-155 wheeled artillery systems.
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, along with officials from KNDS, handed over the first unit to Ukrainian ambassador Oleksii Makeiev in an event earlier today.
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— OSINTtechnical (@osinttechnical.bsky.social) January 13, 2025 at 8:34 AM
Another Russian system vulnerable to attack.
Too bad the Yi Peng 3 was allowed to go on its way.
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🇸🇪 Sweden reports signs of anchor damage to the Nordbalt energy cable, linking Sweden and Lithuania. The damage is believed to have been caused by the Chinese vessel Yi Peng 3 in November, which severed cables between Sweden, Lithuania, Germany, and Finland.
www.lrt.lt/naujienos/pa...
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— NOELREPORTS (@noelreports.com) January 13, 2025 at 3:37 PM
Is Russia’s goal to force Transnistria's reintegration into Moldova in order to destabilize the country? Could that be considered 7th dimensional chess that Russia is not capable of?
Some argue that the gas crisis may lead to Transnistria's political collapse and reintegration into Moldova, dealing a blow to Russia's regional influence.
But analysts say that Transnistria's reintegration is unlikely since it would be too difficult for Moldova to achieve, could provoke Russian aggression against Chisinau or destabilize Moldova by increasing the share of pro-Russian voters. They argue that Moldova has not taken any steps in that direction intentionally.
"There are far too many forces and actors in the Republic of Moldova with whose help the Russian Federation will try to prevent a possible effort to reunify the country and reintegrate Transnistria," Ion Manole, head of Moldovan think-tank Promo-LEX, told the Kyiv Independent.
"The goal of this crisis is to destabilize the Republic of Moldova and bring it under Russia's total control, and by no means to lose control over the Transnistrian region."
A more likely scenario is that Russia will use the ongoing gas and electricity crisis to destabilize Moldova itself and try to bring pro-Russian parties back into power in the upcoming parliamentary elections set to be held in the second half of 2025.
You’d be surprised how quickly something like making people freeze their asses off will prompt the creation of opposition.
Analysts say that the crisis is likely to cause discontent in Transnistria but, due to a lack of opposition, the crisis won't have any major political consequences inside the occupied region.
"No matter how dissatisfied the population may be, it will not lead to an increase in opposition ratings because, in essence, there is no real opposition in Transnistria," Serhiy Gerasimchuk, a Moldova and Romania expert at the Ukrainian Prism think-tank, told the Kyiv Independent.
Anatoly Dirun, a political analyst from Transnistria currently based in Chisinau, also said that "there is no political opposition or alternative political forces (in the breakaway region) that could criticize the current leadership."
Here is a good report on how Transnistria views the situation.
Warm weather has somewhat cushioned Transnistrian residents so far, but they show signs of clear anger and frustration at this situation. At the level of the region’s “administration” the reaction is quite different. They dutifully announce schedules of power outages, plans for community heating centers and the ticking clock timeline of when they run out of coal. They blame Chisinau for this crisis with no basis and claim that the Moldovan government refuses to help them. But what they do not do is actually respond to the crisis. Moldova has offered gas, Ukraine has offered coal, everyone is offering them generators - they are rejecting it all. Currently Transnistria plans on resuming school (holidays have been extended) on January 20th. Statements by their “leaders” seem to imply that they don’t think this crisis will go into February (when coal runs out). All things considered, the Transnistrian leadership is displaying a lot of nonchalance, either because they know something we don’t, or because they are unreasonably optimistic.
He should stay in Moscow.
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⚡️ Transnistria head travels to Russia for talks amid energy crisis, Russian state media claims.
Vadim Krasnoselsky, the head of Moldova's Russian-controlled region of Transnistria, held talks in Moscow regarding the region’s energy crisis, Russian state news agency TASS claimed on Jan. 14.
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— The Kyiv Independent (@kyivindependent.com) January 14, 2025 at 12:58 PM
Another 1,330 lucky winners and 47 artillery systems.
The official Russian explanation is that he was hit by debris from a downed drone.
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FSB counterintelligence officer Vladimir Feshchenko was killed at his workplace in the building of the Russian Ministry of Defense in Moscow.
A bullet hole was found in the man's head. The reason for the murder was a domestic conflict with a military man, with whom he once served together.
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— 🦋Special Kherson Cat🐈🇺🇦 (@specialkhersoncat.bsky.social) January 14, 2025 at 6:45 AM
Two developments — one troubling, the other helpful.
There was a post that said Air Force specialists were being transferred to infantry because of manpower shortages, but Zelenskyy nixed that.
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🇺🇦👀 Zelensky: A separate conversation with the commander of the Air Force. I instructed to clarify everything to the society and not to reduce the number of specialists that the Air Force needs to perform combat missions - our aviation, air defense and mobile fire groups.
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— The Ukrainian Review (@theukrainianreview.bsky.social) January 14, 2025 at 1:09 PM
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According to Ukrainian journalist Yuriy Butusov, President Zelensky has reportedly halted sending people to new brigades, redirecting recruits instead to experienced combat units. If true, this is an excellent decision by him. A good reminder why public discussion was necessary
— Tatarigami (@tatarigami.bsky.social) January 13, 2025 at 3:33 PM
I’m not going to miss Jake Sullivan.
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🇺🇸🇺🇦 Sullivan: "It’s true we could Ukraine cut off. We could say: You get nothing more unless you accept that Russia gets X percent of your territory. But on the prescriptive point, should we do that? I do not agree. That is an inappropriate use of American leverage."
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— MAKS 24 👀🇺🇦 (@maks23.bsky.social) January 14, 2025 at 11:09 AM
He doesn’t want to go back. Can’t blame him.
Coming soon to a war near you.
I have wondered what happens to all that fiber optic cable once it is used in a drone attack.
Will Russia conquer Greenland and Svalbard before or after the Russian Army marches all the way to Portugal?
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‼️Russian MP Andrey Gurulev:
"We need Greenland, no joke. At the very least, we could make a deal with Trump and split Greenland into a couple of pieces. It is clear that Denmark will never be there again. Svalbard is also extremely important to us. There will be some very nice [Russian] bases."
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— Anton Gerashchenko (@antongerashchenko.bsky.social) January 13, 2025 at 3:54 PM
The lessons of war.
Sunset in Ukraine.
