1/ Leaked casualty figures from an elite Russian special forces brigade indicate that it has suffered huge losses in Ukraine, equivalent to more than half of its entire roster of personnel. Scores of men are listed as being 'unaccounted for', in other words having deserted. ⬇️
2/ The 10th Separate Guards Special Purpose Brigade (military unit 51532) is a special forces (spetsnaz) unit under the GRU. It is a 2002 refoundation by Russia of a Soviet-era spetsnaz unit that, ironically, passed to Ukraine when the Soviet Union broke up in 1991.
3/ Since the invasion of February 2022, the brigade has been fighting on the Kherson front, which has seen constant and extremely bloody fighting over the islands in the Dnipro river and delta. Russian sources have reported very high casualties.
4/ The figures, along with names, have been published by the Telegram channel 'Don't Expect Good News'. It says that a staff officer with the brigade has passed it lists of the casualties, missing and deserters since the start of the war, complete with individual names.
5/ The data shows the following casualties since February 2022:
🔺 Killed: 621 men
🔺 Missing in action: 315
🔺 'Unaccounted for' [i.e. deserters]: 169
6/ By the end of 2025, the brigade was far below its normal roster of personnel. The figures were:
🔺 1,811 men rostered, of whom:
🔺 1,230 were on duty
🔺 315 missing in action
🔺 144 unaccounted for
🔺 109 in hospital
🔺 10 under arrest
🔺 3 in captivity
7/ The huge scale of the losses in even an elite unit reflect what commentators have described as an "astonishing" level of casualties. Spetsnaz soldiers are considerably better trained and equipped than regular infantry, so their loss will be significantly more harmful. /end
1/ Russia has reportedly effectively privatised its air defence systems, shifting their cost onto regions and private businesses. This is likely resulting in wealthy Moscow getting a disproportionate amount of air defences while poorer regions languish. ⬇️
2/ VChK-OGPU (now restored to Telegram following Pavel Durov's falling-out with the Kremlin) reports that according to a source, "the federal centre has effectively shifted funding for the creation of ever-new air defence lines for Russian cities to the regions…
3/ …(Moscow is no exception). The air defence systems themselves come from the Ministry of Defence (and sometimes their creation is financed by regional budgets), but the expensive preparatory and communications work falls to regional budgets.
1/ How could Russia counter Ukraine's ongoing and increasingly devastating drone campaign against its logistics? One Russian warblogger suggests a possible approach, but another says it won't happen due to the army's systemic deficiencies ⬇️
1/ Russian soldiers who are blind, deaf, have lost limbs, or are in wheelchairs, are having their medical discharges cancelled and are being sent back to Ukraine to fight. It appears to be Russia's latest measure to make up for its huge losses. ⬇️
2/ Seriously injured soldiers with category 'G' status (temporarily unfit for service) are being rounded up at home in Russia and declared fit again by military doctors, before being sent back to war. Relatives say that appeals to the authorities are having no effect.
3/ 38-year-old Pavel Podgrushny from Krasnodar was blown up by a mine in 2024, suffering head and chest injuries and losing his hearing and his left eye. He was treated in Volgograd, discharged to recuperate at home, and given a prosthetic eye.
1/ A leaked order from the Russian army instructs military drivers to disguise their vehicles as civilian ones, repainting them in non-military colours and applying the logos of civilian organisations to their sides. However, this appears to violate the Geneva Conventions. ⬇️
2/ The 'Combat Reserve' Telegram channel has published an extract from the order, which reads:
3/ "3. In view of the enemy’s use of AI-powered strike UAVs, and in order to prevent incidents and avoid the destruction of military equipment during enemy UAV operations, as well as to safeguard the lives and health of service personnel, the formation commander has ordered:
1/ Even as Ukraine invests in accelerating its middle-strike campaign against Russian forces, Russian counter-measures are nowhere to be seen, according to a Russian warblogger and military volunteer. He says that Putin "doesn't give a shit". ⬇️
"The entire route to Crimea, from Taganrog to Chonhar, should have been secured with light air defence – anti-aircraft fire units. It should have been done yesterday. But who is doing this?"
3/ "I recently drove there in a Ural truck to Zaporizhzhia and back: I saw only ‘mushroom clouds’ ahead of me and behind me and heard ‘pops’, but I didn’t see a single anti-aircraft gun or machine-gun crew. So I drove with my pants full of fear. God had mercy on me.
1/ Six crippled Russian soldiers, some on crutches, are sent to their deaths in Ukraine with three bulletproof vests and two automatic rifles between them. "It's just fucking crazy," says the man filming it, who is now likely missing in action. ⬇️
2/ The video was filmed by 50-year-old Sergei Aleksandrovich Pisarchik, a soldier in the Russian Army's 69th Motorised Rifle Division. He sent it to his relatives on 21 May 2026 and stopped communicating afterwards.
3/ The division was reported to be fighting around Vovchansk north of Kharkiv earlier in the year.
Pisarchik says: "We are going on a combat mission with two assault rifles and three body armours for six of us. We are all cripples. It's just fucking crazy."