Free Republic

Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold a cabinet meeting on Monday with senior officials, amid concerns about Ukraine's High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) from the United States that Western officials claim hamper Moscow's war efforts. The rocket systems first arrived in Ukraine in June from the U.S and have been seen as crucial to helping Kyiv's forces repel the Russian military. The Russian state-backed TASS news agency reported on Monday that Putin will hold the cabinet meeting via videoconference on Monday, with the main topics being the development of air transport and aircraft manufacturing. Deputy Prime Minister and Trade...

Ukraine's military has confirmed that the eastern city of Lysychansk has fallen to Russian forces. "After heavy fighting for Lysychansk, the defence forces of Ukraine were forced to withdraw from their occupied positions and lines," the army general staff said. Earlier Russia's Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said his forces had captured Lysychansk and taken full control of Luhansk region. Its general staff said that "in order to preserve the lives of Ukrainian defenders, a decision was made to withdraw".

Dramatic footage shows the moment a Russian colonel crashes in his helicopter after being hit with a Ukrainian missile. Lt-Col Sergey Gundorov, 51, was struck near Volnovakha in the Donbas. The military helicopter flew on after being hit with a portable surface-to-air missile. His stricken Mi-35 touched the ground before cartwheeling over a narrow strip of woodland and crashing in a fireball in a field. Flames and black smoke are seen from the explosion. A second Russian helicopter is seen firing decoy flares and apparently escapes unscathed. Gundorov is the 55th known Russian colonel to be killed in Vladimir Putin's...

TEHRAN (Tasnim) – The Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday that the country’s warships destroyed a command center with Kalibr cruise missiles, killing dozens of Ukrainian officers. “More than 50 generals and officers of the Ukrainian Armed Forces were killed,” the statement said. The strike took place near the village of Shirokaya Dacha in Dnepropetrovsk Region. The strike hit the compound where commanders of several Ukrainian units had gathered for a meeting, Moscow said.

ARIS/BERLIN/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Is it better to engage with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his invasion of Ukraine or to isolate him? Should Kyiv make concessions to end the war, or would that embolden the Kremlin? Are ramped up sanctions on Russia worth the collateral damage?These are some of the questions testing the international alliance that swiftly rallied around Ukraine in the days after the Russian invasion but that, three months into the war, is straining, officials and diplomats told Reuters.As Western governments grapple with spiralling inflation and energy costs, countries including Italy and Hungary have called for a quick...

Laurie Meadows 11 June 2022 [ last edited 13 June 2022 2040 UTC] This is a follow up article to the article I wrote on 19th of February 2022, 5 days before the launch of the Russian special military operation in Ukraine. It was called 'Mutually Assured Destruction - the Prelude to Mutually Assured Security'. At the time, I didn't think Russia would move into the Donesk. I wrote: "The current lead that Russia has in missile and defensive systems might persuade the US to agree to verifiable arms control, but this is the work of years. In the meantime,...

Russian forces could be just weeks away from seizing control of the key Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine — as Ukrainian officials continued to appeal for more heavy weapons and ammunition from the West. An unnamed senior US defense official told The Washington Post that the cities of Severodonetsk and Lysychansk, which have seen some of the fiercest battles in recent weeks, could fall to Russia in the coming days. Russia has been making steady gains in the strategically important Donbas region — comprised of Luhanks and Donetsk — by pounding the area with heavy artillery day after day and...

Almost 4 months after the start of a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the war turned into an "artillery duel". And victories in battles are increasingly being won by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. A significant role in this is played by the supply of Western weapons, which are gaining momentum, but are still insufficient. Der Spiegel writes about this in an analytical article. "At the beginning of the offensive, when Russian troops began to advance in large columns from the north to major Ukrainian cities such as Kiev and Kharkiv, the goal was to lure the enemy into ambushes,...

A big part of the problem in defending this part of Donbas, Ostap believes, is that the people who have stayed behind — the people who haven’t fled — don’t really believe they are part of Ukraine. In his view, the civilians who remain are all separatist sympathizers. He says they help the Russians navigate backcountry roads that aren’t on the maps. He asserts there have been instances of local collaborators getting caught providing information about Ukrainian troop movements or locations. Indeed, Slovyansk fell to Russian separatists in 2014: The retaking of the city by the Ukrainian military later that...

The euphoria that accompanied Ukraine’s unforeseen early victories against bumbling Russian troops is fading as Moscow adapts its tactics, recovers its stride and asserts its overwhelming firepower against heavily outgunned Ukrainian forces. Around 200 Ukrainian soldiers are now being killed every day, up from 100 late last month, an aide to President Volodymyr Zelensky told the BBC on Friday — meaning that as many as 1,000 Ukrainians are being taken out of the fight every day, including those who are injured. But the odds against the Ukrainians are starting to look overwhelming, said Danylyuk, the government adviser. “The Russians are...