Simplicius' recent piece on Ukraine and a little on Israel.

My summary:

I never really know how much stock to put in the reports by certain Ukrainian soldiers and such (the plural of anecdote is not data after all) so I'll leave most of it out, though there is a report by a soldier in the 47th brigade - which was rotated away from the Zaporozhye front after taking such high losses that there were fears that the soldiers would mutiny, and sent to try and stop Russia around Avdeevka - that the casualties that they're experiencing are the most horrific in the entire conflict. Considering the absolute killing ground that Zaporozhye was and is, one shudders to think.

Anyway, over in Avdeevka, Russia has continued their very slow and steady advance, taking a slag heap and planting their flag on it, which the Ukrainians got pissy about and fired drones at the flag. Russia wants to gain control of the coal coke plant as it's a good position to watch over a large chunk of the battlefield here, so that'll be next on the agenda probably. Comparisons are being made by both sides to Bakhmut, and again to the appalling strategy of hold-territory-at-any-cost-to-prevent-embarrassment. A representative of a DPR brigade said that the town will fall "soon", which in Russian speak is "hopefully within this decade".

Ukraine is trying to make their Kherson D-day happen, but it's not going to happen. The logistics simply are not there. They aren't being sneaky ninjas, undercutting Russian defences by daringly finding a weak spot to cross the river and then continue onwards - they are being pounded on marshy river islands.

Rumors continue, as they have for the last month or two, of a new front soon opening up from Belgorod. Apparently Russia has withdrew most of their troops from Belarus and so an assault on Kiev isn't in the cards, but something around Kharkov might well be. Reports that Ukrainians are using 14-15 year olds now on that front to try and have some presence there but I don't really know how much stock to put in it. Russia may be trying to form some kind of south-bound offensive on the west side of the Oskil river, which doesn't mean that Kharkov itself has to be threatened, but we shall just have to wait and see.

Simplicius talks about Russia's Orlan reconnaissance drone, and how Ukraine is having a massive amount of trouble dealing with the extensive information that they give to Russia, so much so that Simplicius calls it “the single most successful combat drone in the history of warfare," far surpassing the Reapers and Predators that the US uses to bombard Afghani weddings. Tens of thousands of objects have been destroyed thanks to the Orlan. It is cheap, flexible, durable, and versatile - all things that the US can no longer make, and that Russia has generally excelled at. The anti-drone Volnorez jammers that Russia is putting on more and more armored vehicles are also briefly mentioned. Russia continues to repel fairly large (by Ukraine's standards) drone and missile attacks on Crimea without breaking much of a sweat. And Russian air defence is reportedly well on its way to figuring how to counter ATACMS.

In more international news, Russia has conducted their final tests on the Burevestnik missile, which is nuclear-powered and thus can essentially travel forever. This is causing some in the United States to freak the fuck out, because the problem is that their radar and missile detection is located along the logical places that they would expect Russia to strike from, and not, say, around the Mexican border, but now this missile gives Russia the ability to fire a missile, send it on its merry way skirting around known missile detection sites, do a loop-de-loop a dozen times over the Pacific ocean for funsies, and then land it through the US's southern border and hit their military factories - of which they already have pretty few. So US arms companies are scouting out places to put new radar sites.

Simplicius describes Israel as in a lose-lose situation. Israeli commanders have said that the operation will take 3 months, though it could be much more drawn out than that. If Israel stops, then the damage done to Gaza will only give Hamas more and more angry recruits and strengthen them, far from weakening them. If Israel goes in, then they might face horrific losses that the demoralized state might not be able to withstand. A former CIA chief has warned Israel about this. And this is just Gaza - Hezbollah could also cause extremely major problems. Regardless, it seems that Ukraine will be going through a bullet and artillery famine as deliveries to Israel are prioritized.

It seems like the US has been trying to pull Israel back from the brink and stop - or at least stall - the ground operation to try and get things set up. The US has a total of 4 THAAD batteries and 50 Patriot batteries, and they're sending a quarter of those to the Middle East. The US is even drawing up a plan to evacuate all American citizens from the region if worst comes to worst. Meanwhile, the Resistance has been busy too, with the Hezbollah-Israel border clashes amping up, the strikes on US bases in Iraq, and Yemen firing those missiles towards Israel that were shot down. There is a rumor that Russia is allowing Iran to use one of their military airbases in Syria to land their planes to facilitate arms transfers given that Israel keeps knocking Aleppo and Damascus airports out. Meanwhile, Lavrov went off to Iran, and Russia's deputy defence minister met with Iraq's ambassador and talked about the conflict.