1/ The commander of Ukrainian's unmanned air forces, Robert "Madyar" Brovdi, has announced a set of reforms to improve the effectiveness and logistical supply of drones in the Ukrainian armed forces. They are to be implemented over the next three months. ⬇️
2/ As described by the 'Cuckoo's Nest' Telegram channel:
🔺 Immediate implementation of existing collective experience.
3/🔺 Transparent results: 6-7 units of the Unmanned Systems Line of Drones will be included in the TOP-10 according to the existing rating of the effectiveness of the UAV units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
4/ 🔺 Unified SYSTEM: all units of the Unmanned Systems Line of Drones performing combat missions at the front will operate in a single electronic system of planning, analysis, coordination, management, and online reporting with automatic verification of all results (June–July 2025).
5/ 🔺 12 layers of SBS influence on the strip in tactical and operational depth: immediate step-by-step launch or reinforcement in SBS units of the drone line of all 12 layers of influence on the assigned strip (following the example of the use of the 414th Separate Brigade,…
6/ …including SIGINT, EW, radar, enemy UAV fighters, remote mining, echeloned use of anti-Shahid means, anti-pilot action groups, etc.), immediate launch of retraining of the armed forces, competent provision of means, technologies and control systems (June–September 2025)
7/ 🔺 Building up our own existing ammunition production for competent and timely provision, and not according to the final principle of "we fight with what we have left." Ammunition is waiting for pilots, and not vice versa.
8/ 🔺 Single composition of critical components. Creation of a single supply warehouse and timely provision of units with a package of 50 critical means and components (such as StarLink, additional batteries for drones, mobile electronic warfare systems, FPV and bomber customization components, peripherals, power banks, pickups, etc.).
9/ 🔺 Ground robotic complexes - as the main means of logistics of warheads, drones and peripherals to pilots in positions, etc.
10/ 🔺 A single recruiting campaign for the SBS and basic + professional at the same time (analogous to the already introduced training system in the Drone Line), its own network of FPV schools, bombers, wings, electronic warfare, radio-electronic warfare, radars, fighters, NRK, etc.
11/ 🔺 PILOTS FLY, EVERYONE ELSE WORKS TO SUPPORT THE PROCESS. Revision and optimization of the combat and emergency response forces of the SBS, retraining and prompt training of inexperienced or incompetent crews,…
12/ … reprofiling by types of flight activities, revision of dead souls, guest workers, draft dodgers in military uniform, the tired and the dodgy.
13/ 🔺 COUNT-PLAN-RECEIVE-FIGHT. Unified analysis of the capabilities and fact of use, results in the context of drone / ammunition models for the implementation of accurate planning and implementation of support.
14/ 🔺 Separate section - the use of UAVs at strategic depth.
15/🔺 R & D (center for innovation and implementation of developments). Transformation of the current center from the brigade level to the level of support of the branch of the armed forces and more (15 models of already implemented projects and means).
1/ A Russian warblogger fighting in eastern Ukraine says that an unprecedented number of Ukrainian FPV drones is causing huge casualties. He claims that both sides are using chemical weapons and complains about the quality of reinforcements.
2/ The 'How I went to war. Platon Mamatov' Telegram channel highlights recent aspects of the war:
"1. Walking through the forest belts to the Dnepropetrovsk region, there are many corpses, I have never seen so many during the entire war. There are really a lot of them."
3/ "2. We are not angels either, we also use chemical weapons somewhere, but we are somewhere with them, I can't see, but when they were poisoning us, when I was running from an FPV to the dugout (knowing that it was there).
1/ More than three years into the war in Ukraine, Russian army training is still often reported to be only cursory. Soldiers are usually given only a few days of training and a single outing to the shooting range. A Russian warblogger discusses why this is. ⬇️
2/ The 'Partisan' Telegram channel comments:
"Combat training? No, we haven't heard of it.
The fourth year of the war. To put it mildly, there is no development or improvement in the combat training of troops heading to the front. Quite the opposite."
1/ Organised crime is now thriving in the Russian army as a result of its recruitment of tens of thousands of convicts. Former inmates extort, rob and torture soldiers with impunity to extract millions of rubles in pay and bonuses from them, as two recent accounts highlight. ⬇️
2/ Aleksandr Vladimirovich Efreemov of the 9th Separate Motorised Rifle Brigade (military unit 71443) told his wife that "If you don't find the money soon, they'll kill me". After arriving at a location in Ukraine, he was thrown into an open-air pit along with many other men.
3/ His wife says: “He spent all this time in a pit, and there were boys sitting there with him. They were beaten every day with clubs and rebar, and money was beaten out of them.”
1/ At least 133 Russians POWs freed from Ukrainian captivity are reported to have have died or gone missing in action after being sent back to the front lines, in violation of the Geneva Conventions. Some are said to have been executed. ⬇️
2/ As previously reported, returning POWs are being treated harshly by the Russian authorities and are often sent straight back into combat, without even a family reunion. New research by Verstka illustrates their fate.
3/ Data from the 'I Want to Live' project identifies a total of 133 people from 49 Russian regions and three occupied regions of Ukraine. They comprise a mixture of mobilised men, career military and Wagner Group mercenaries.
1/ The occupied regions of Ukraine are facing a deepening ecological and economic crisis, with critical shortages of water, rapid desertification, and the collapse of agriculture and industries across the occupied territories. Russia is doing little to resolve it. ⬇️
2/ Southern and eastern Ukraine have a naturally hot and dry summer climate that is being exacerbated by climate change. Until Soviet irrigation initiatives in the 1950s, the southern mainland of Ukraine and the interior of the Crimean peninsula were arid semi-deserts.
3/ The now-destroyed Kakhovka Reservoir alone supplied more than 12,000 km of canals in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, with reservoirs supplying Crimea and the Donbas in eastern Ukraine. Water supplies depend on infrastructure neglected or destroyed in the war.
1/ A leaked list of casualties from a Russian battalion taking part in an offensive suggests a killed/wounded ratio of 1:36 to 1. According to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, losses stand at over 100,000 dead this year alone. ⬇️
2/ A reported list of the losses of the Russian 3rd Motorised Rifle Battalion of the 9th Separate Motorised Rifle Brigade (military unit 71443) lists 163 casualties in only a month. Daily casualties are stated to be between 5 and 10 per day.
3/ This is almost certainly an underestimate, as commanders often underreport losses to make themselves look better or to exclude those who have been executed or tortured to death by their own side. The brigade is known for cruelty towards its men.