Relentless attacks on Russian oil / Leak warns of Russian banking collapse / Middle Zone havoc / Nuclear reactor parts disguised as “manhole covers” / Russia lays traps for air defence crews
Loved the rolling pin in the regimental patch. Don't expect our vaunted "free press" to fulfill their critical role in a free society. Which we ain't. Money talks and big money distorts and silences. Keep up your great work.
My goodness, that droid TW 12.7 is a game changer! And those Slaughterbot drones are super scary! And the Polish underwater drone? Wow! And the RMMV HX truck? Your report is just remarkable, frankly; where is the media news on this? Ukraine is doing beautifully and is going to win! Thanks for all of your reporting.
I have a copy of Harper's mag, mar/april 2026, article translated from French, titled "Conflict Resolution, Has Russia Won the War" by Oliver Kemp... I didnt finish reading it, found it upsetting... wondering if this author falling for russian dis/mis info...I am able to finish the article thank you so much
I will look into it. It sounds fascinating. Thanks.
[One hour later]
It is a fascinating piece. I don't know if the brigadier-general is actively promoting pro-Russian talking points but they are there. To advance his thesis, the piece exaggerates, ignores inconvenient facts, and distorts timelines. However, this may merely be an ill-informed retired officer who cannot challenge his Cold War-era concept of Russian military power.
Here are a few of the standard Russian talking points that I noticed. I should emphasise that they are all contradicted by facts and events on the ground:
- The sense of Russia's inevitable victory.
This ignores the fact that Russia's has not even regained the territory it was driven out of in 2022, or anything close to it. Not even by area. This is a common and very successful piece of information warfare since it conveniently obliterates from history Ukraine's sweeping counter-offensives in late 2022 and reinforces the idea that Ukraine has never been successful offensively.
- That Russia is winning the war by increments because Ukraine cannot resist the demographic, territorial and diplomatic pressures put upon it.
This is a war of attrition. In the Seven Year's War, whilst vastly outnumbered, Frederick the Great's tiny Prussia's defeated giant Russia by trading territory for enemy losses. Ukraine is following the same strategy. Conflicts, especially modern wars, are rarely decided by major battles. At the moment, all the evidence shows Ukraine getting stronger daily whilst Russia gets weaker.
- That Russia's infiltration tactics are a cunning and deliberate ploy.
This ignores the obvious fact that infiltrating small numbers (rarely more than half a platoon) into the Drone Wall means that even if those soldiers achieve their objective, it cannot be quickly exploited, because any major mechanised force that followed up would be obliterated. These tiny infiltrations are literally all Russia can do (see the 'Tank Army' report in this bulletin). As things stand, there will be no major breakthrough. It is worth pointing out that Putin demanded the full occupation of the Donbas in early 2023. It has not happened yet and may never. None of the 'cities' (small to medium-sized towns really) that Russia has captured since mid-2022 carry any major strategic or economic value (the Donbas' archaic heavy industry cannot survive without subsidies). Russia has now been so degraded by attrition that it no longer has the military capacity to occupy any of Ukraine's major cities. Even Kharkiv, the second largest city and only 25km from the Russian border, remains uncaptured despite four years of fruitless Russian offensives.
- Turning Ukrainian successes into failures
The Drone Wall has demonstrably transformed the battlefield in Ukraine's favour but Kempf flips that on its head without evidence. More than eighty per cent of Russian soldiers who march into the Drone Wall never return. That is docmented by the videos from Ukraine's battlefield drones. The latest figures are that, of those who do not return, more than nine in ten are killed. The rest are usually left by Russia to die from their wounds. I am fairly certain that no army in modern history has suffered such a high kill rate. Meanwhile, Ukraine is content to leave most of the frontline thinly-manned because its drones are doing the killing. Ukraine sees no need to throw lives away needlessly when it has a manpower shortage.
_________________________________________________
I've only picked things out of the first half of the piece, I could go on and on but I don't have the time. I still wonder about why Kempf wrote this. I will leave you with two thoughts:
1. Kempf may be similar in outlook to all the analysts and pundits who predicted, back in early 2022, that Ukraine would fall within weeks. Two eminent military historians, Profs. O'Brien and Cohen, conducted a study of this failure in analysis. It is a good and relatively short read. Freely available too ('The Russia-Ukraine War—A Study in Analytic Failure' — https://www.csis.org/analysis/russia-ukraine-war-study-analytic-failure). The tldr is that those who got it wrong had extensive knowledge of Russia's military, but almost none of Ukraine's. And the few who correctly predicted Ukraine's resistance had taken the time to study that country's capabilities and morale.
2. Every military officer and NCO in NATO armies is taught that you need at least three times more attackers than defenders to have a chance of capturing an objective. Operational warfare is all about creating or defeating that advantage on the battlefield. Yet Russia's attacking advantage in numbers is barely greater than Ukraine's defenders. Instead of a ratio of 3:1, it is, by Kempf's figures, only 1.375:1. That indicates how insanely badly Russia's war has been conducted. Likewise, NATO soldiers work to the rule that if a unit takes 10% casualties (wounded and dead) it loses operational efficiency and has to be withdrawn. Russian attacking units took 95% casualties in recent weeks and almost all of those are deaths inflicted by drones. How does that tally against Kempf's claims? And how come Kempf, a former brigadier-general, seems so blissfuly unaware of any of this?
I hope he is simply another victim of this under-reported war and nothing more.
If Kempf is a former US general, or even European general, he is just not familiar with the kind of warfare that Ukraine is waging. In fact, it seems like the US military is not familiar with this. Unless their troops either embed with Russia, which seems internally dangerous from everything I have read about how corrupt the Russian military is and how they make their soldiers pay to stay alive, and it is never ending payments; or embed with Ukraine, which makes them sympathetic to Ukraine and not to Trump, they are not going to be getting this experience. It does not seem like the war against Iran is giving this kind of experience.
I keep hearing how Russia might expand into Europe. I cannot conceive of it, when European countries together outnumber the Russian population by so many. They also have the finances together, and as we have read Greenpeace says that they are matched to Russia with weapons.
Removing Trump will remove some of Russia's support tactically speaking because Trump is helping Russia fund its war by removing sanctions on its oil. So, perhaps Europe will step up and negotiate a "peace" or perhaps it will end when Trump is out of power, and a more friendly US president is in place. Of course, this is why Putin will interfere with the US election as he always does,.
So glad to see your interest, and your analysis...I was able to finish reading the piece without getting upset last night, mostly because I was armed with info from your Substack, thanks so much. I guess this is excellent demonstation of russians being really good at info warfare. Harper's publishes dissenting letters to editor, I wonder if they received/ published any
Loved the rolling pin in the regimental patch. Don't expect our vaunted "free press" to fulfill their critical role in a free society. Which we ain't. Money talks and big money distorts and silences. Keep up your great work.
My goodness, that droid TW 12.7 is a game changer! And those Slaughterbot drones are super scary! And the Polish underwater drone? Wow! And the RMMV HX truck? Your report is just remarkable, frankly; where is the media news on this? Ukraine is doing beautifully and is going to win! Thanks for all of your reporting.
Thanks for your kind words.
Stating facts about developments is useful. Adding context that lays out the Russian angles is even better.
A podcast that you may appreciate:
https://theeasternborder.substack.com/p/230-the-empire-bleeds
Thanks
Slava Ukraini!
I have a copy of Harper's mag, mar/april 2026, article translated from French, titled "Conflict Resolution, Has Russia Won the War" by Oliver Kemp... I didnt finish reading it, found it upsetting... wondering if this author falling for russian dis/mis info...I am able to finish the article thank you so much
I will look into it. It sounds fascinating. Thanks.
[One hour later]
It is a fascinating piece. I don't know if the brigadier-general is actively promoting pro-Russian talking points but they are there. To advance his thesis, the piece exaggerates, ignores inconvenient facts, and distorts timelines. However, this may merely be an ill-informed retired officer who cannot challenge his Cold War-era concept of Russian military power.
Here are a few of the standard Russian talking points that I noticed. I should emphasise that they are all contradicted by facts and events on the ground:
- The sense of Russia's inevitable victory.
This ignores the fact that Russia's has not even regained the territory it was driven out of in 2022, or anything close to it. Not even by area. This is a common and very successful piece of information warfare since it conveniently obliterates from history Ukraine's sweeping counter-offensives in late 2022 and reinforces the idea that Ukraine has never been successful offensively.
- That Russia is winning the war by increments because Ukraine cannot resist the demographic, territorial and diplomatic pressures put upon it.
This is a war of attrition. In the Seven Year's War, whilst vastly outnumbered, Frederick the Great's tiny Prussia's defeated giant Russia by trading territory for enemy losses. Ukraine is following the same strategy. Conflicts, especially modern wars, are rarely decided by major battles. At the moment, all the evidence shows Ukraine getting stronger daily whilst Russia gets weaker.
- That Russia's infiltration tactics are a cunning and deliberate ploy.
This ignores the obvious fact that infiltrating small numbers (rarely more than half a platoon) into the Drone Wall means that even if those soldiers achieve their objective, it cannot be quickly exploited, because any major mechanised force that followed up would be obliterated. These tiny infiltrations are literally all Russia can do (see the 'Tank Army' report in this bulletin). As things stand, there will be no major breakthrough. It is worth pointing out that Putin demanded the full occupation of the Donbas in early 2023. It has not happened yet and may never. None of the 'cities' (small to medium-sized towns really) that Russia has captured since mid-2022 carry any major strategic or economic value (the Donbas' archaic heavy industry cannot survive without subsidies). Russia has now been so degraded by attrition that it no longer has the military capacity to occupy any of Ukraine's major cities. Even Kharkiv, the second largest city and only 25km from the Russian border, remains uncaptured despite four years of fruitless Russian offensives.
- Turning Ukrainian successes into failures
The Drone Wall has demonstrably transformed the battlefield in Ukraine's favour but Kempf flips that on its head without evidence. More than eighty per cent of Russian soldiers who march into the Drone Wall never return. That is docmented by the videos from Ukraine's battlefield drones. The latest figures are that, of those who do not return, more than nine in ten are killed. The rest are usually left by Russia to die from their wounds. I am fairly certain that no army in modern history has suffered such a high kill rate. Meanwhile, Ukraine is content to leave most of the frontline thinly-manned because its drones are doing the killing. Ukraine sees no need to throw lives away needlessly when it has a manpower shortage.
_________________________________________________
I've only picked things out of the first half of the piece, I could go on and on but I don't have the time. I still wonder about why Kempf wrote this. I will leave you with two thoughts:
1. Kempf may be similar in outlook to all the analysts and pundits who predicted, back in early 2022, that Ukraine would fall within weeks. Two eminent military historians, Profs. O'Brien and Cohen, conducted a study of this failure in analysis. It is a good and relatively short read. Freely available too ('The Russia-Ukraine War—A Study in Analytic Failure' — https://www.csis.org/analysis/russia-ukraine-war-study-analytic-failure). The tldr is that those who got it wrong had extensive knowledge of Russia's military, but almost none of Ukraine's. And the few who correctly predicted Ukraine's resistance had taken the time to study that country's capabilities and morale.
2. Every military officer and NCO in NATO armies is taught that you need at least three times more attackers than defenders to have a chance of capturing an objective. Operational warfare is all about creating or defeating that advantage on the battlefield. Yet Russia's attacking advantage in numbers is barely greater than Ukraine's defenders. Instead of a ratio of 3:1, it is, by Kempf's figures, only 1.375:1. That indicates how insanely badly Russia's war has been conducted. Likewise, NATO soldiers work to the rule that if a unit takes 10% casualties (wounded and dead) it loses operational efficiency and has to be withdrawn. Russian attacking units took 95% casualties in recent weeks and almost all of those are deaths inflicted by drones. How does that tally against Kempf's claims? And how come Kempf, a former brigadier-general, seems so blissfuly unaware of any of this?
I hope he is simply another victim of this under-reported war and nothing more.
If Kempf is a former US general, or even European general, he is just not familiar with the kind of warfare that Ukraine is waging. In fact, it seems like the US military is not familiar with this. Unless their troops either embed with Russia, which seems internally dangerous from everything I have read about how corrupt the Russian military is and how they make their soldiers pay to stay alive, and it is never ending payments; or embed with Ukraine, which makes them sympathetic to Ukraine and not to Trump, they are not going to be getting this experience. It does not seem like the war against Iran is giving this kind of experience.
I keep hearing how Russia might expand into Europe. I cannot conceive of it, when European countries together outnumber the Russian population by so many. They also have the finances together, and as we have read Greenpeace says that they are matched to Russia with weapons.
Removing Trump will remove some of Russia's support tactically speaking because Trump is helping Russia fund its war by removing sanctions on its oil. So, perhaps Europe will step up and negotiate a "peace" or perhaps it will end when Trump is out of power, and a more friendly US president is in place. Of course, this is why Putin will interfere with the US election as he always does,.
So glad to see your interest, and your analysis...I was able to finish reading the piece without getting upset last night, mostly because I was armed with info from your Substack, thanks so much. I guess this is excellent demonstation of russians being really good at info warfare. Harper's publishes dissenting letters to editor, I wonder if they received/ published any