To paraphrase Tacitus: They made a desert and called it victory.
Unconfirmed but these reports have been reliable.
“Feb 17 (Reuters) - Ukrainian forces shot down two Russian Su-34 fighter-bombers and one Su-35 fighter in the skies over eastern Ukraine on Saturday, the country’s air force chief said.
“On the morning of February 17, 2024, in the eastern (sector), units of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine destroyed three enemy aircraft at once - two Su-34 fighter-bombers and one Su-35 fighter,” Mykola Oleshchuk wrote on Telegram.”"
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-shoots-down-three-russian-warplanes-air-force-chief-says-2024-02-17/
The Russians usually claim, “just damaged”.
The Russians confirmed at least one of the those, by posting a picture of the pilot with the SAR heli crew that picked him up.
Not losing the pilot is a moral and practical victory but the aircraft may be hard to replace.
The prime minister of Denmark has announced they will transfer all of their artillery and ammunition to Ukraine.
All of it.
Wow. That is awesome.
Well, let’s hope someone else will help us, should it be necessary. Since article five is in doubt, I would have preferred to keep a bit of our own.
I don’t suppose it matters, though, our little country with a small army wouldn’t be able to stand against Russia with or without artillery.
Actually I wonder if it is true. None of the Danish news sites carry that news.
ETA I was wrong:
Russian forces executed six Ukrainian troops captured after Avdiivja was retaken.
A spokesperson for Ukraine’s military intelligence confirmed the death of Maksym Kuzminov to the Kyiv Post but did not provide details. According to the outlet, Russian media reported Kuzminov had been found dead with at least five bullet wounds in an underground parking lot in southern Spain, near Alicante.
Russians have reported a HIMARS strike on a formation of soldiers killed at least 65 and an unknown number of wounded. Apparently they were lined up waiting to be addressed by a general. Also killed a Colonel. It seems like they would have learned by now not stand in formation anywhere in Ukraine.
The Ukrainian air force has claimed another Su-34 downed today. That makes 7 Su-34 & Su-35 claimed in the last week. Some of these claims have been corroborated, but not all of them.
In other news, a Russian milblogger “Murz” who volunteered and fought for the Russian army back in the ‘little green men’ days in 2014, and who has been regularly posting on Telegram criticisms of how the war has been handled, has reportedly committed suicide. Just a day or two ago he had revealed the number of casualties the Russian army was internally admitting it had lost taking Avdiivka (16,000 “irretrievable” losses, meaning dead and injured seriously enough they’ll be discharged). This morning he posted that he had been forced to take down that post, and that he intended to kill himself.
Murz had frequently been featured on the War Translated channel on Twitter, often complaining in particular about how units from the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk Republic were treated by the regular Russian forces.
There is as of yet no report on how many times he shot himself in the back.
This was pretty cool:
Article includes video of open-doored warehouses as seen by several FPV drones that flew in and blew up various vehicles inside.
The ‘low battery’ and ‘land now’ warnings added to the excitement.
This must be pretty high on the “ease vs value of targets destroyed” scale.
It also points out something very operationally interesting: those FPV drones were operating at the ragged edge of their range. The article even speculates that they were operating beyond their normal remote control range, which is why the Russians felt secure leaving the warehouses open like that (beyond simple laziness and complacency). But there have been rumors that the Ukranians have some kind of remotely piloted relay drone that extends the controllable range of the weapon drones.
The implication is that the Ukrainians extended the range of their first-person quadcopters, possibly by flying them in a long formation with a larger “repeater” drone that captured, and rebroadcast, the FPVs’ command signals. With the help of a repeater drone, an FPV might range more than 10 miles.
95% or more of Ukrainian drone videos feature low battery warnings.
Might as well get full use out of the battery. It ain’t getting used again
Never noticed it before. (But then, I watch fairly few of the videos.)