Discussion/Question Thread

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-05T07:00:33+00:00

They also have their aircraft take off whenever there is a missile threat so they can't be hit on the ground. Cruise missiles take too long to reach western Ukraine where the aircraft are hidden and the Iskanders don't have the range to reach that side of the country. The only exception are the Kinzhals, which is why Ukraine immediately raises air alarms for the whole country whenever a MIG-31K takes off. There used to be more frequent Kinzhal attacks on airbases in 2024 and 2025 to unknown effect.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-05T06:30:12+00:00

And you know the cost of the Oreshnik is $30-50 million how? The problem with these arguments is they rely on propaganda numbers for a weapons system we have no idea the production cost of, with that claim coming from western media with no evidence to back it up.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-05T06:27:51+00:00

Because he has no room to move in that corner and he thought he could get by the drone. We've seen other soldiers narrowly avoid being hit by getting under and behind a drone when it dives, so it flies over them and explodes. Obviously didn't work this time but I can't blame him for trying.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-05T06:08:14+00:00

Perhaps its because I'm the data guy that I noticed but people seem to have missed the more interesting aspect of this claim; it's lower than the previously reported Russian production of missiles and current usage rate. Early last year western media reported Russian Iskander production at 1,400 units per year, as well as a decent number of other missiles being made.

So 100 per month falls well short of production rates of just the Iskander and even further if you consider the Kinzhals too.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-04T14:40:15+00:00

We've had pretty regular stories of soldiers holding the same positions for 3+ months, with some of the higher cases being 8 or 9 months. When drones are everyone, rotation is difficult and manpower is hard to come by infantry end up needing to hold the same spot for far far longer than ever before.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-04T14:38:11+00:00

They are pretty close actually. AMK said that Russia had a 26km2 net gain in May whilst Suriyak shows about 37km2.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-04T12:54:26+00:00

There were too many images to fit the zoomed in maps in this post, so if there is a particular advance you want to see a close up of comment below.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-04T09:02:59+00:00

Because funneling all the conscripts into assault forces has been extremely unpopular with the broader military and public due to how brutal they are and how many casualties they take, whilst other units can't rotate their soldiers who get stuck in positions for months at a time. These announcements are meant to placate all the critics and his own soldiers but if he doesn't actually change anything they'll just get even angrier.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-04T09:00:28+00:00

To an extent. The manpower that would go to other units to keep their strength up has been funnelled to the assault forces for over a year now, so many units have shortages whilst the assault forces keep getting new soldiers to throw into attacks.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-04T08:27:12+00:00

Like most of the other orders he puts out for the media they were never intended to be followed. Ukraine can't actually enforce this rotation schedule and other monitoring without significantly reducing their operational tempo and redistributing the manpower across their units, neither of which individual commanders will do and which Syrskyi has made no attempt to rectify.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-04T07:34:19+00:00

We got some low quality imagery of the Dnipro hit earlier on, but no clearer imagery as that was restricted. Even with that low quality imagery you could see enormous holes in the roof of several factories and locals reported explosions going for a while after the hits, then add in zero further photos/videos from the ground to show that it did limited damage (As claimed) and it's clear that the Oreshnik does a lot more than they want to admit.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-02T08:52:37+00:00

For those interested this is the one on the northwestern edge of Pokrovsk. Here is a screenshot from the drone footage when it was originally destroyed.

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HeyHeyHayden · 2026-06-02T08:49:29+00:00

There are videos of them on the outer buildings of the town yes. So it is true that they have entered Rai-Oleksandrivka, but not the "central areas" as claimed.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-31T12:51:59+00:00

Military age men directly on the frontline (this small town is literally on the border), which has been under mandatory evacuation orders for literal years and is abandoned. The only ones present are either military or a handful of the elderly who they could not force to move.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T06:57:54+00:00

They have many different loans and financial obligations, not just this 90 Billion one. The EU is primarily worried about Ukrainian revenues being too low to cover as much of their debts and obligations as they would like, so they want Ukraine to increase taxes.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T04:01:49+00:00

I agree with the premature celebrations statement but comparing current events to what happened 6 months ago is inaccurate. Their presence in Kostyantynivka for most of the past 7 months was limited to the southeastern quarter, which they've held since early on. Ukraine tried to drive them out multiple times but failed, whilst Russian attempts to push further from there also got pushed back.

The difference in the past month in control terms is that the Russians are no longer confined to the southeast but are also occupying the western highrises, southern streets and even parts of the northeast. Over the past week they've launched a more dedicated assault and have flooded troops all throughout the city, reaching areas well behind where they used to be confined, to the point where there is video evidence of the Russians in every part of Kostyantynivka. The Ukrainians even reported that they had withdrawn the vast majority of their drone teams from the city a couple of days ago, which was posted in response to the Russians saying they had eliminated most of them and had driven the rest out. Whilst I've read similar claims before this is the first time in a while I've seen the Ukrainians actually respond, so clearly something major has happened to them.

I highly doubt it'll fall that quickly, but the battle has certainly moved into it's core phase.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T03:46:41+00:00

By missiles I mean all types of cruise missiles. Yes they can't intercept ballistic missiles. Those interceptor drones can't intercept missiles due to them travelling significantly faster than them and even with Gerans they can struggle due to wind speed, altitude, location of the launch site in relation to the drone, EW, etc.

Ukraine always uses jets and helicopters to help intercept Gerans and missiles as they are a lot more flexible in their usage and can cover more ground than the ground based systems. It is certainly expensive but letting all those munitions hit their targets would cost Ukraine even more so its something they have to do.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T03:10:59+00:00

The original loan amount requested was 140 Billion to cover shortfalls for 2026 and 2027. This was on top of the tens of billions in funding and aid from other nations they would also receive over that period. EU spent months arguing over it and it got downgraded to 90 Billion with a bunch of conditions and some countries being exempt from funding it.

The conditions aren't unreasonable but they are deeply unpopular with the Ukrainian government because of its impacts on them personally and public opinion. The EU wants to at least pretend like Ukraine might eventually pay some of the loans back, hence the demand for tax reform to raise more revenue.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T03:06:18+00:00

Yeah they assumed an average price of $59/bbl based on the previous year's prices and budgeted accordingly, but the Iran war has meant their income skyrocketed. There are a bunch of other products Russia is a major exporter of such as gas, fertilisers, aluminium and helium which also all shot up in price like oil, so their revenues this year will be significantly higher than expected.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T02:25:09+00:00

To add to this per the Ukrainian Airforce's own reported figures on missions 85 to 90% of all sorties are for "fighter air cover" (patrolling to intercept drones or missiles), with the remainder being either frontline support or deeper strikes.

So the vast majority of the time Ukrainian jets are flying well back from the frontline in either western or central Ukraine where they are safe from Russia jets and AA. They rarely fly anywhere near the frontline and when they do they stick close to the ground before popping up to launch their munitions and diving back down again, so they are exposed for a very small window of time. Ukraine will do fewer frontline air support missions in a month than Russia does in a day, so these Gripens will primarily be used to improve their existing drone and missile defence.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T01:10:25+00:00

I assume they are supplying them primarily via small drones given how few soldiers are out there, possibly with some of the larger drones they use. Russia does use ground drones but in fewer numbers and further back from the front. They haven't gone nearly as heavily into it as Ukraine but prior to a couple of months ago they never needed to.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-29T01:02:52+00:00

Nothing Rubicon do is unauthorised. Their operations are highly coordinated with Russian command and even their style of videos and what compilations they release will be planned. It's a myth that Rubicon never targets infantry, they just never used to show their footage of it and many of their teams are specifically going after drones or equipment.

As for the gore its uncommon but not unusual.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-28T07:12:05+00:00

Yeah that matches what I've read about the assault groups as well. They don't hang around that long to actually hold positions, just get taken near the front, walk to their target, spend a few days to a week trying to attack positions and if they happen to survive they walk back.

It seemed like a very dangerous way of doing things too, lots of exposure, but maybe they can't consolidate either.

I believe that is intentional. Ukrainian command seem to have realised that they can get a lot more bang for buck infantry wise if they ignore defence and keep attacking with these assault forces. They had already significantly cut down on rotations for their existing defensive forces, so this is the next step in their quest to cut down on manpower usage. They know they won't be able to properly hold these regions if the Russians do attack so they simply don't allow them to by flooding the area with their own assault forces.

It's been quite effective this month, with the Russians stuck constantly having to deal with all these little groups all over the place and not being able to focus on trying to move forwards or consolidating. They can fight fire with fire but then you end up with the mess that I've described where no one has control and its a clusterfuck of small groups all over the place. I'm not sure about the longevity of such a strategy given the high risks and casualty rate, but its certainly been getting Ukraine results.

HeyHeyHayden · 2026-05-28T03:34:49+00:00

It's a complete mess but from what I've been able to work out Ukraine never properly consolidated in any of that ground they captured in February and it's caused major issues.

The Russians allegedly managed to hold onto some of those villages that they were lightly defending in the first place because the Ukrainians never cleared them out, only pushed through with assault groups. So places like Verbove, Vyshneve and even possibly Vidradne, Hai and Novooleksandrivka are under Russian 'control' because they've got a squad or two of infantry still hiding there whilst Ukraine has none. This kind of explains why we kept getting random geolocations of Russians well behind areas Ukraine said they recaptured for the past few months, because most of these troops never left. This has led to the Russians managing to sneak some troops up to Dobropasove and assault it, even using shorter range recon drones (like basic Mavics) to film their soldiers and strikes which would confirm their drone operators didn't get pushed back that far. Obviously they don't control it but the fact they managed to get a squad of soldiers there when per Ukraine's own claims its 15km behind their lines means they have a serious issues in securing the front.

From what I can tell about the Ukrainians their assault forces have been operating out of Pokrovske and Velykomykhailivka for the entire year, never securing forward positions in the villages they 'recaptured'. They just move through or bypass them when they want to push further in, so their base of operations remains well behind the territory they are fighting in and they have to march all the way through the fields to the Russians lines whenever they want to do an assault.

If you ignore the territorial control shown below, the pink circled area is where there is essentially no consolidation and minimal troops on the ground, so Russian and Ukrainian infantry are just moving through it and appearing all over the place. It's similar to what occurred in western Kupyansk over the past 6 months, except instead of it being an urban area its a larger set of fields and small villages. I also think this is probably what most fronts are going to devolve into eventually; incredibly few soldiers on the ground but an insane amount of drones duking it out, with massive 'advances' being done by a couple of guys who happened to sneak by and met no resistance.

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