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ChrisO_wiki Profile picture
ChrisO_wiki
@ChrisO_wiki
Independent military history author and researcher. Coffee tips are appreciated! https://t.co/t1EjNrIZ2c Now also at https://t.co/4qGQ2ffHJJ
May 15 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
1/ Russia's shrunken Victory Day parade in Moscow on 9th May has been a TV ratings flop, reflecting a lack of public interest and its exceptionally short duration. Russian broadcasters report 25% fewer people tuning in this year. ⬇️
2/ The Russian news outlet 'We can explain' reports that the combined rating for the Victory Day Parade broadcast across the three main broadcasters (Channel One, Rossiya 1, and NTV) this year was only 16%. This is a near-25% drop from the 20.5% rating recorded in 2025.
May 15 • 10 tweets • 3 min read
1/ Russian warbloggers are mystified and angry at a recruitment advert for the Russian army posted on the Facebook-like social network VK. Unlike the usual ads, which show Russian soldiers as muscular supermen, it's attracting attention for being a lot more realistic. ⬇️ Image
Image 2/ Sergei Moskalkov, who spotted the advert, declares angrily:

"This isn't a fake, not a disinformation-like collage, but a genuine advertisement for contract service in the Russian Armed Forces.

This is a VK ad.

#fifthcolumn
#lawlessness"
May 15 • 15 tweets • 3 min read
1/ Russian propagandists see their anti-Ukrainian conspiracy theories about secret bioweapons being vindicated by the news that the Trump Administration is to probe previous US Administrations' funding of biological research laboratories worldwide. ⬇️ Image 2/ Since 2022, the Russians have promoted claims that the US was operating dozens of secret laboratories in Ukraine to research bioweapons, including novel diseases and so-called "combat mosquitos". Propagandists claimed that Ukraine was under US "military biological occupation".
May 15 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
1/ Ukraine is reportedly using large 'drone carrier' unmanned surface vessels (USVs), each carrying between six to eight FPV drones as well as themobaric rockets, to attack multiple targets on the strategic Kinburn Peninsula in Crimea. ⬇️ 2/ The Russian Telegram channel 'Archangel of Special Forces' posts footage apparently taken by a Russian UAV of what it says is a Ukrainian USV off Kinburn. According to the channel, the Ukrainians have been launching an increasing number of attacks against Russian positions:
May 15 • 18 tweets • 3 min read
1/ The stress of Russia's worsening economic problems, Internet shutdowns, and the war in Ukraine is reportedly causing a huge decrease in Russian citizens' happiness, and a corresponding surge in antidepressant prescriptions and morbidity. ⬇️ Image 2/ The Russian 'Political Report' Telegram channel reports that antidepressant sales in Russia are setting new all-time records year-on-year, alongside opinion polls suggesting substantially worsening levels of unhappiness:
May 14 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
1/ The notorious Russian colonel Igor 'Evil' Puzik is once again making news for the wrong reasons. His regiment's political officer is reported to have confessed to the FSB that he and the colonel were imprisoning and torturing their own men to extract money from them. ⬇️ Image 2/ Colonel Puzik, the commander of the 87th Motorised Rifle Regiment, is widely detested by Russian warbloggers, his own men, and their relatives, for his alleged corruption, brutality, and willingness to send men to their deaths or shoot them himself to shut them up.
May 14 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
1/ Why can't Russia have n̶i̶c̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶s̶ interceptor drones that work, unlike Ukraine? The answer, says one warblogger, is that Russia's military-industrial complex has been captured by big vested interests who've made it into a "gravy train". ⬇️
2/ '¡No Pasaràn!' compares Ukraine's P1-SUN with Russia's Yolka interceptor drone:

"The Ukrainians also made a "Yolka." How is it different from ours?

P1-SUN.
Acceleration up to 450 km/h.
Interception altitude up to 5000 m. Image
May 14 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
1/ The Russian army's response to the threat of Ukraine's drones is to give its soldiers prayer cards appealing for divine help against "demonic drones". Incredulous Russian warbloggers are demanding something a bit more tangible. ⬇️ Image 2/ The text of the "Prayer against demonic drones" says: "O, Saint Barbara, the great martyr and patroness, look upon us who grieve and suffer from the demonic drones, that sow death and destruction."
May 14 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
1/ The Russian government's claims that it isn't blocking GitHub are widely disbelieved by Russian commentators, who continue to protest about the severe impact that the apparent restrictions on accessing it will have on military-industrial software development. ⬇️ Image 2/ The military-technical Telegram channel 'Atomic Cherry' is one of many to note that Russian software developers – like developers everywhere – are functionally dependent on the open-source code libraries provided by GitHub:
May 13 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
1/ The Russian Navy now appears to be covering entire submarines in anti-drone nets. A satellite photograph published by a Russian warblogger shows two net-covered Pacific Fleet submarines anchored alongside quays. ⬇️ Image 2/ According to the Russian warblogger 'Ramsay', the photo "shows the Pacific Fleet's submarine command attempting to prevent a repeat of Operation Spiderweb." The location in question is the Rybachiy Naval Base in Kamchatka, over 7,300 km from Ukraine. Image
May 13 • 24 tweets • 5 min read
1/ Russian programmers are reporting that GitHub, the world's largest cloud platform for IT projects and collaborative development, is becoming increasingly inaccessible for them. The reasons aren't clear, but it's a looming disaster for Russian military and civilian IT. ⬇️ Image 2/ The Internet censorship monitoring service OONI has recorded a growing trend, beginning on 5th May, of failed connections to Github from Russian users, reaching 16% of all Russian connection attempts. Image
May 13 • 24 tweets • 4 min read
1/ The Russian army is infected from top to bottom with false reports and fake military successes, costing many lives, according to a Russian warblogger fighting in Ukraine. He says that little effort is being made to root out the tide of lies. ⬇️ Image 2/ The Russian army's tendency to produce and disseminate false information up the ranks all the way to Vladimir Putin has been noted often before. It has often backfired publicly on the army, most recently with its false claims to have captured Kupyansk.
May 12 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
1/ The Russian government's Internet shutdown from 5th to 9th May appears to have been predictably badly implemented. It seems to have spilled out from Moscow across Russia and also affected SMS and phone calls, causing widespread disruption and public anger. ⬇️ Image 2/ The restrictions were officially explained as security measures leading up to and during the Victory Day parades in Moscow and St Petersburg. Russian firms issued advisories to download maps, stock up on cash, and use Wi-Fi. In practice, far more got broken than anticipated.
May 12 • 17 tweets • 3 min read
1/ Even as Hezbollah pounds Israeli forces in Lebanon with FPV drones, Ukraine's ambassador to Israel says that the Israeli government has rebuffed offers of help from Ukraine and hasn't extended an invitation for President Volodymr Zelenskyy to visit. ⬇️
2/ In an interview with Israeli news outlet Ynet, Ukraine’s ambassador to Israel, Yevgen Korniychuk, says that Israel is missing an opportunity to learn from Ukraine's experience in countering weaponised drones.
May 12 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
1/ Morale is so good in the Russian army that its soldiers are deliberately committing crimes to get themselves sent to prison and thus save their lives, according to a veteran pro-Russian soldier in Ukraine who has been fighting since 2014. ⬇️ Image 2/ The Telegram channel 'When the cannons started singing' provides an illustration of the Russian army's current state of mind, from "our friend and subscriber, a war veteran who served with the militia since 2014 and later with the Russian Armed Forces":
May 12 • 24 tweets • 4 min read
1/ Four years into the war in Ukraine, the Russian Ministry of Defence is still leaving its soldiers critically short of all kinds of essential military supplies, according to the 'Two Majors' Telegram channel. Donated and self-purchased supplies are only a drop in the ocean. ⬇️ Image 2/ 'Two Majors' contrasts the very slow, hugely bureaucratic and still heavily paper-based Russian approach to military procurement to Ukraine's nimble Brave1 military marketplace, which allows units to procure what they need online:
May 12 • 13 tweets • 3 min read
1/ A Russian soldier fighting in Ukraine's Donbas region provides a gloomy picture of life on the front lines. A constant flow of doomed stormtroopers go on one-way trips, drones make logistics a game of Russian roulette, and thirsty men drink from muddy, corpse-filled holes. ⬇️ Image 2/ 'BCh 3' writes on Telegram:

"It’s been said before—war gives rise to many different truths."
May 12 • 14 tweets • 2 min read
1/ The war in Ukraine has been very beneficial for one particular group: Russia's aging elite of super-rich oligarchs, who have recorded a record-breaking increase in their wealth. It's a sign of how sanctions and state capture have hugely boosted the oligarch class. ⬇️ 2/ 'Political Report' notes that the collective wealth of the 155 Russian members of the 2026 Forbes rich list has increased by 11 percent during 2025, reaching a record $696.5 billion, despite the pressure of sanctions and an increasingly difficult economic situation.
May 11 • 29 tweets • 6 min read
1/ Yuri Kozarenko, the high-profile Russian drone developer who was arrested last Friday on fraud charges, is being accused of passing off Chinese products as his own. Other Russian UAV developers say that his firm was notorious for "brazen relabeling of products from China." ⬇️ 2/ The video above shows a drone claimed by Kozarenko's company to be its 'Quadcopter Krechet' model. It's actually a Chinese-made Autel EVO MAX 4T, which has been relabelled as a Russian-made product without even any cosmetic modifications to disguise its origins.
May 11 • 18 tweets • 4 min read
1/ Igor 'Strelkov' Girkin thinks things are terrible in Russia, which is "being beaten and will continue to be beaten" and is being "humiliated before the entire world" due to the failures of "the cretins in power." He also ridicules his prison's motley Victory Day parade. ⬇️ Edited picture of Igor 'Strelkov' Girkin, who wants everyone to know he's not happy 2/ In a letter to a friend, posted on his Telegram channel, he writes:
May 11 • 25 tweets • 6 min read
1/ The Russian ultranationalist community has exploded into a fit of apoplectic rage over Volodymr Zelenskyy's decree 'permitting' Russia to hold its Victory Day parade. They condemn it as a humiliation for Russia and call for maximum retaliation. ⬇️
2/ Russian Telegram channels have had a meltdown over Zelenskyy's decree declaring Red Square to be off-limits for attacks on 9th May in order "to permit the holding of a parade in the city of Moscow (Russian Federation)." Many helpfully translate it for their readers.