Russia Invades Ukraine. Again
POSTED BY: captaincrunch
UPDATED: Sunday, September 6, 2026 21:09
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Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) recruitment programs are reportedly failing to compensate for the rising Russian casualty rate amid costly advances in Ukraine. The Ukrainian Foreign Intelligence Service (SZRU) reported on July 12 that the Russian MoD recruited about 195,000 contract soldiers as of early July 2026 — less than 50 percent of Russia’s annual contract recruitment goal of 409,000.[1]
SZRU reported that Russia’s daily recruitment rate fell from about 1,200 people per day in 2024 to 1090 recruits per day in mid-2026 and noted that Russia’s recruitment rate is insufficient to accomplish Russia’s annual goal. SZRU noted that growing battlefield losses have forced the Russian MoD to relax its medical and other administrative standards for recruiting candidates and intensify efforts to recruit students, foreigners, and residents in Russian-occupied Ukraine. Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief General Oleksandr Syrskyi reported on July 14 that Russian forces currently suffer over 400 casualties per each square kilometer that Russian forces seize in Donetsk Oblast.[2]
ISW previously assessed that Russian forces suffered around 1,298 casualties per square kilometer they seized or infiltrated in June 2026 compared to an average of 68 casualties per kilometer seized in June 2025 at the theater level.[3]
ISW’s calculations differ from those in Syrskyi’s statement due to several methodological factors. ISW’s assessment accounts for theater-wide casualties while Syrskyi’s figures specifically refer to the Donetsk Oblast. ISW is unable to independently estimate Russian casualty levels within individual Ukrainian oblasts. It is also unclear how Syrskyi’s statistics account for the areas in which Russian forces conduct infiltration missions, suffer casualties, but do not successfully seize. Ukrainian forces also recently liberated areas near Lyman, and it remains unclear how territorial control changes resulting from newly liberated Ukrainian territories factor into the Russian casualty rate when calculating the quantity of square kilometers that Russian forces seized. Syrskyi’s figures all the same provide a helpful metric for quantifying the overarching trend in how Russian forces pay very steep prices for meager tactical gains, regardless of the specific methods used to quantify such figures. Russia’s high casualty rates, regardless of calculation method, reflect Ukraine’s ability to undermine Russian battlefield operations and inflict significant personnel losses.[4]
Russia’s casualty rate overtook its recruitment rate in March 2026, and Russian forces will likely continue struggling to generate replacements amid the rising casualty rate without compulsory mobilization.[5]
https://understandingwar.org/research/russia-ukraine/russian-offensive
-campaign-assessment-july-14-2026/
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
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After the Sea of Azov, Ukraine’s Drone Fleet Turns to the Black Sea, Hitting 20 Russian Ships
By Ivan Khomenko | Jul 15, 2026 11:34
https://united24media.com/war-in-ukraine/after-the-sea-of-azov-ukraine
s-drone-fleet-turns-to-the-black-sea-hitting-20-russian-ships-20788
Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces (SBS) say they have expanded their campaign against Russia’s so-called shadow fleet from the Sea of Azov into the Black Sea, claiming strikes on 20 Russian vessels overnight.
According to statements published by SBS Commander Maj. Robert “Madyar” Brovdi on July 15, Ukrainian drone units struck 20 Russian vessels overnight, including 17 oil tankers, two LNG tankers, and one tugboat. Brovdi said an official report and video evidence would be released later.
According to Brovdi, the latest operation marks a new phase of Ukraine’s maritime drone campaign after SBS concluded what it described as the first stage of operations in the Sea of Azov.
“One hundred sixteen vessels of Russia’s shadow fleet in the Sea of Azov—the first round of the naval battle is complete. Now it’s the Black Sea: 20–0 today. We hunted 17 oil tankers, two LNG tankers, and one tugboat. An official report, along with video evidence, will follow.”
He did not disclose the identities of the ships or the extent of the reported damage.
In a separate statement, Brovdi responded to comments made by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who had described Ukraine’s previous attacks on Russian tankers in the Sea of Azov as “terrorism” and “worse than piracy.”
“There is no piracy, Lavrov—just business. Yours. Bloody. In the sights of the Free Ukrainian Bird. To the bottom of the sea.”
The latest announcement follows a sustained Ukrainian campaign against vessels linked to Russia’s shadow fleet. According to previous SBS statements, Ukrainian forces struck 116 Russian vessels in the Sea of Azov over the preceding nine days before shifting operations into the Black Sea.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
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Russia has begun removing 10-40 MVA transformers from Northern Crimean Canal pumping stations, idle since Moscow destroyed the Kakhovka dam.
By Olena Mukhina | July 14, 2026
https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/07/14/consequences-of-own-destruction
-russia-is-stripping-canal-it-killed-to-fix-crimean-substations-ukraine-keeps-hitting/
Russia has started removing the transformers from the Northern Crimean Canal, which historically supplied up to 85% of the Crimean Peninsula's fresh water. ATESH partisans say occupation authorities have begun hauling them to electrical substations damaged by Ukrainian strikes. The claim has not been independently verified.
The reason, according to ATESH, is that Russia has run out of spare transformers. A new one of this class takes six months to a year and a half to build, and sanctions prevent Russia from quickly buying one abroad.
So the occupation is cannibalizing its own infrastructure — pulling equipment off one facility to plug the hole in another. The units being taken are not junk: 10- to 40-MVA transformers that once fed large pumping stations, including NS-355 on the Connecting Canal. That class of equipment fits almost any substation.
The pumping stations are available for stripping because the canal has not worked since June 2023. Russia blew up the Kakhovka dam, and the Dnipro level at the intake fell below critical levels, and the flow of Dnipro water into Crimea stopped. The pumps have sat idle ever since.
Russia is dismantling the consequences of its own destruction to repair the damage from Ukrainian strikes.
Transformers are going where war needs them
Russian command now prioritizes facilities that feed the defense industry, rail junctions, air defenses, radars, and command posts, per ATESH.
Moving transformers from dead pumping stations to those substations is an attempt to restore power fast, without waiting for foreign deliveries or long production runs.
ATESH calls it a dead end. The stock of equipment that can be pulled from other sites keeps shrinking, and every new Ukrainian strike opens a new hole with nothing left to fill it.
Ukraine has been burning Crimean substations for three weeks
The claim lands in the middle of a sustained campaign. Ukrainian drones have hit Crimean power infrastructure night after night since late June.
Ukraine struck 37 energy facilities across occupied southern Ukraine between 1 and 5 July, targeting electrical substations and transformers in Crimea and parts of Kherson, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts, according to Unmanned Systems Forces Commander Robert Brovdi.
Occupation authorities declared a peninsula-wide state of emergency on 26 June. They have shut children's camps, halted civilian fuel sales, and imposed rolling blackouts.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
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Putin Was Xi’s Role Model. Now He’s the Junior Partner.
Four years of war and economic isolation have reduced the Russian president to a supplicant in a relationship growing more imbalanced
By Lingling Wei and Thomas Grove | July 13, 2026 9:06 pm ET
https://www.wsj.com/world/x-putin-junior-partner-df611b88
Xi Jinping once admired Vladimir Putin. Now he manages him.
Four years of war and economic isolation have reduced the Russian president to a supplicant in a relationship growing more imbalanced—and at times tense.
Before Putin made his 14th trip to meet with Xi in China, he publicly signaled that the two countries would strike a breakthrough agreement on energy. Indeed, his May visit had no bigger ambition than persuading Xi to greenlight a second natural-gas pipeline between Russia and China—known as the Power of Siberia 2, a project two decades in the making that Moscow desperately needs.
But the Russian delegation that flew to Beijing ahead of Putin ran into a brick wall. Chinese officials made it clear to the visiting head of Gazprom, Russia’s state-owned gas giant, that they would sign up to the pipeline only if Russia sold them gas at the same lower-than-market rate Moscow sells domestically, said people with knowledge of the talks. In essence. Beijing was asking the Kremlin to subsidize the project.
Driving home their point. Beijing’s officials told the Russians not to raise the issue again until the terms changed, the people said.
A day later. Putin left the Chinese capital having signed 42 agreements and joint declarations. The pipeline deal wasn’t among them. Beijing offered no public explanation.
“Xi received Putin like an emperor receiving his visitor in his castle,” said Joerg Wuttke, a veteran German business executive with long experience in China-Russia relations, “and sent him home.”
Lesson from 1960s
Xi appears to understand the lesson from the 1960s, when Soviet heavy-handedness toward China as the “younger brother” helped fracture that earlier alliance. For now, Xi is careful to treat Putin with respect in public even as he seeks to extract concessions in private.
Still, the May visit couldn’t be more different from the two men’s first meeting in 2013, when Xi chose Moscow for his first foreign trip as Chinese leader. Xi expressed admiration for the Russian leader, calling him his “role model," according to people with knowledge of the conversation.
What Xi admired, the people said, was Putin’s ability to command a seat at the world’s top table despite running an economy highly dependent on oil and gas—rather than a diversified one like those of the U.S. and China.
Now, Putin’s Ukraine war didn’t just bog down Russia. It handed Xi the leverage to finish a power shift that was already underway, turning what was once a partnership of near equals into a relationship China now dominates in almost every dimension.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
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Nobody cares, Shit Golem.
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Those who dance always seem crazy to those who can't hear the music.
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Crimea has almost completely run out of water.
T
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Surrounded on all sides by water and nothing to drink...
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Those who dance always seem crazy to those who can't hear the music.
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Quote:6ix, drinking Black Sea water will kill Russians, so I applaud your idea. The Black Sea is salty, but less salty than the global oceans. Its surface waters average about 17 to 18 parts per thousand (ppt) in salinity, which is half as salty as the open ocean (~35 ppt).
Originally posted by 6ixStringJack:
Surrounded on all sides by water and nothing to drink...
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Those who dance always seem crazy to those who can't hear the music.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
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A $50 computer just flew Russia’s newest jet drone into a Ukrainian grain ship—and jamming couldn’t stop it
Russia’s fast, highly autonomous Geran-4 one-way attack drone is the weapon of choice for strikes on Ukrainian grain ships.
By David Axe | July 14, 2026
https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/07/14/geran-4-vs-grain-ships/
The Geran-4 Seeker drones pummeling Ukrainian ports combine jet propulsion, mesh radio control, and machine-vision targeting run off a Raspberry Pi—the same $50-class hobbyist computer that schoolchildren use to build robots. They're the best one-way attack drones in the Russian inventory, and cause for concern in Kyiv as the dueling Ukrainian and Russian countershipping campaigns escalate.
"Seeker is controlled by an operator via a radio mesh modem, but it can be locked onto a target and handed over to its machine-learning algorithms to complete an attack in the presence of EW jamming," Canadian drone expert Roy noted.
Ships aren't the only targets in the Geran-4s' crosshairs. The jet-propelled drones also struck two Ukrainian air force Mikoyan MiG-29 fighters on the ground at Voznesensk airfield in southern Ukraine on or just before 27 June. Where older, propeller-driven Gerans cruise at just 340 km/hr, the jet-propelled Geran-4 cruises at 500 km/hr or faster. The newer, faster drone outpaces many Ukrainian interceptor drones, making it harder to take down by kinetic means.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
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Thousands rally in Kyiv, other cities against Defense Minister Fedorov's dismissal, demand reappointment
President Volodymyr Zelensky's dismissal of Mykhailo Fedorov has sparked a wave of criticism from lawmakers, soldiers, veterans, and civil society figures, who argue Ukraine is losing one of its most effective wartime officials without a clear explanation.
By Oleksiy Sorokin, Tim Zadorozhnyy | July 16, 2026 11:25 AM (Updated: July 16, 2026 12:55 pm)
https://kyivindependent.com/thousands-rally-in-kyiv-other-cities-again
st-defense-minister-fedorovs-dismissal-demand-reappointment/
Reflecting on his tenure, Fedorov highlighted more than 20 major achievements, including disrupting Russian forces' access to Starlink systems, coordinating strikes against Russian logistics in occupied Crimea, and launching what he described as "an unpopular but extremely important" military reform.
Tatiana Bohdanovska, 29, whose 22-year-old brother Kostiantyn Kaminskyi, call sign "Castet," was killed fighting in Kharkiv Oblast in 2022, said she viewed the decision as a betrayal of those who had sacrificed their lives defending Ukraine.
"My brother died believing this country would become different," Bohdanovska told the Kyiv Independent. "If the government had invested earlier in technology and supported the army the way it should have, maybe he would still be alive."
She argued that Fedorov had begun modernizing Ukraine's military by investing in technology and tackling entrenched corruption.
"For the last six months, he produced results that soldiers supported," she said. "He started changing a system that is very old and very corrupt. Maybe someone in the government isn't ready for those changes. But we are — and that's why we're here."
Bohdanovska also compared Fedorov's dismissal to the replacement of former Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi, saying both decisions came after the officials had earned broad public trust. . . .
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two
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