(Image by NEIVANMADE)

Today is the 210th birthday of Taras Shevchenko.

“Battle on – and win your battle!
God Himself will aid you;
At your side fight truth and glory, Right and holy freedom.”

Taras Shevchenko

📷: Oleksii Bobovnikov pic.twitter.com/gywuyBXbT5

— Defense of Ukraine (@DefenceU) March 9, 2024

🎉 Today, Ukraine marks Taras Shevchenko's 210th birthday, celebrating the enduring spirit of resilience. Let's draw strength from his words:
"Fight—and you’ll be victorious,
God is helping you!
On your side is justice, on your side is glory,
And holy liberty!"#Shevchenko210 pic.twitter.com/cDKLFCdFj7

— Ukrainska Pravda in English (@pravda_eng) March 9, 2024

Ukrainian soldier reads Taras Shevchenko's "Kobzar" on Kremlin ruins. A fitting tribute on #ShevchenkoBirthday. 🇺🇦

📷 Alighiero Dante pic.twitter.com/J3RuyhPB1c

— Maria Avdeeva (@maria_avdv) March 9, 2024

President Zelenskyy spoke earlier today at the 2024 Taras Shevchenko National Prize ceremony. Video below, English write up after the jump.

The President and the First Lady took part in the 2024 Taras Shevchenko National Prize ceremony

9 March 2024 – 15:36

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy and First Lady Olena Zelenska participated in the ceremony of awarding the 2024 Taras Shevchenko National Prize.

“Today, we announce worthy winners of the Shevchenko Prize. We thank them,” said the Head of State.

According to the President’s decree, the 2024 Taras Shevchenko National Prize in the Music Art category was awarded to artist Susana Jamaladinova (Jamala) for the album Qirim.

Also in the Music Art category, composer Karmella Tsepkolenko received the prize for cantatas “Reading the History” based on the poetry of Oksana Zabuzhko, “Where are you coming from, dark caravan, you flock of birds?” based on the poetry of Serhiy Zhadan, Duel-duet for violin and double bass, and Symphony No. 5.

In the Literature category, the prize was awarded to poet and servicewoman Yaryna Chornohuz for the poetry book “[dasein: defense of presence]” and to poet and serviceman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Dmytro Lazutkin for the poetry book “Bookmark.”

Artist Andriy Yermolenko received the award in the Visual Arts category for the series of artworks “Ukrainian resistance.”

The laureates of the prize in the Theatrical Art category were stage director Ivan Uryvsky, production designer Tetiana Ovsiichuk, and choir conductor Susanna Karpenko for the performance “The Witch of Konotop” based on the story by Hryhoriy Kvitka-Osnovyanenko at the Ivan Franko National Academic Drama Theater.

In the Publicism/Journalism category, the prize winners were Yevhen Maloletka, Mstyslav Chernov, and Vasylysa Stepanenko for a series of journalistic materials on the siege of Mariupol (reports, photo and video reports, investigations, and the film “20 Days in Mariupol”). The film crew is in Los Angeles, representing Ukrainian cinema at the Oscar award ceremony.

The President called on those present to honor the memory of Ukrainian artists whose lives were taken by the Russian war.

“Viktoria Amelina. Volodymyr Vakulenko. Anton Romanchenko. Viktor Onysko. Ivan Kuzminsky. And many, many others… Who created and added deep meaning to the simple mode of address ‘Ukrainian men, Ukrainian women.’ I ask now to honor the memory of all whose lives became the life of Ukraine,” said Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

He said that war may take away a talented person from us, but it will never take away the memory of how much this talent has gifted Ukraine and our people, nor will it take away the respect for it.

“I want the memory of Ukrainian talents to never fade away. I want the strength of Ukrainian talents to never diminish. And I want applause to Ukrainian talents always sound in Ukraine,” added the President.

The solemn event was attended by Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Ruslan Stefanchuk, Head of the President’s Office Andriy Yermak and his deputies, Chairman of the Committee on the Taras Shevchenko National Prize of Ukraine Yevhen Nyschuk, Acting Minister of Culture and Information Policy Rostyslav Karandieiev, and other officials.

Also invited to the prize ceremony were military pressonel of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the National Guard, the State Border Guard Service, and employees of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine.

The Taras Shevchenko National Prize of Ukraine is a state award for the most outstanding works of literature and art, journalism, and publicism, which are the pinnacle of the spiritual heritage of the Ukrainian people, affirm high humanistic ideals, enrich the historical memory of the people, their national consciousness and identity, aimed at state-building and democratization of Ukrainian society. This year, the prize amount is UAH 429,000 each.

The Vatican:

Our flag flies with two colors 🇺🇦!
White doesn't belong to us. #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/5UgIOzzllP

— Maria Avdeeva (@maria_avdv) March 9, 2024

And course, it's again the victim and the defender that suddenly must have 'courage of the white flag of negotiations' — not the aggressor and not the murderer.

Of course, because it's much easier to twist Ukraine's arms from some form of imagined high moral ground and profess…

— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) March 9, 2024

And course, it’s again the victim and the defender that suddenly must have ‘courage of the white flag of negotiations’ — not the aggressor and not the murderer.

Of course, because it’s much easier to twist Ukraine’s arms from some form of imagined high moral ground and profess oneself holier-than-thou.

It’s not Russia and Vladimir Putin that must immediately stop the biggest European war of aggression since Adolf Hitler that continues for 10 years — it’s Ukraine that must roll over and voluntarily jump into a mass grave with a bullet in the back of its head to ‘make things simpler’.

So evangelic, so spiritually driving, so clairvoyant, so merciful.

We must have courage and allow the enemy to take our children and turn them into soldiers who will kill their own people – said the Pope
– We must have courage and allow the enemy to take away our children and kill their identity – said the Pope@Pontifex

— Volodymyr Demchenko (@brokenpixelua) March 9, 2024

You have to have courage and give up your life. End it. Said The Pope

— Volodymyr Demchenko (@brokenpixelua) March 9, 2024

Papa Francesco has also pissed off Patron!

Nope+ https://t.co/bOIuiyk1n6

— Patron (@PatronDsns) March 10, 2024

Good job everybody!

Tatarigami provides a very well thought out and detailed response to why any negotiated agreement with Russia to end the war would not actually end the war.

Every now and then, I converse with people from political and analytical fields globally, particularly from Europe and the US. Eventually, our discussions turn to where the war should end and what should it look like. Some directly express concerns, suggesting that certain…

— Tatarigami_UA (@Tatarigami_UA) March 9, 2024

Every now and then, I converse with people from political and analytical fields globally, particularly from Europe and the US. Eventually, our discussions turn to where the war should end and what should it look like. Some directly express concerns, suggesting that certain political circles legitimately ponder why Ukraine doesn’t just sign a peace deal with Russia if Russia can’t be defeated. This, of course, aligns with a Russian narrative portraying Russia as an undefeatable dove seeking peace, while Ukraine is depicted as a warmongering state.

Unfortunately, the truth is, even if we sign some sort of truce or peace accord, there would be absolutely no security guarantees to prevent Russia from regrouping and attempting to repeat its actions later. While some Western politicians and former officials publicly state that Ukraine should join NATO soon, these are often just words without substantial backing. Even if they would be backed by an official agreement, the violation of such promises doesn’t carry significant consequences beyond reputational damage.

In 2014, Ukraine was advised not to escalate against Russia in Crimea, leading to further escalation as it created a perception of Ukrainian weakness. Russia then attempted to replicate the scenario in Donbas. Our failure to liberate Donbas and the failure of the West to help only solidified Russian confidence in taking over Ukraine, eventually leading to the events of 2022. So, what exactly would prevent Russia from launching another offensive just a few years later?

I’ve also come across suggestions that if Ukraine were to sign a peace agreement, it would provide an opportunity to rearm and resupply its army. However, this raises another question for me – who and why would precisely arm Ukraine during peacetime, especially when in 2024 Ukraine is already facing challenges in securing foreign military aid? If anything, obtaining military assistance during a time of war for the right to exist seems more feasible than trying to secure the same volumes during peacetime.

Russians don’t just annex territories – they almost immediately erase Ukrainian presence in every dimension. They forcefully russify the local population, imprison, deport, or execute the most prominent pro-Ukrainian activists, leaders, and cultural symbols. They pillage crops, move industrial machinery from factories to Russia, or simply take over businesses and profit from them. While some may find it easy to suggest abandoning these people and signing a peace deal, we all know that after eight years of such policies in Donbas and Crimea, Russia has formed multiple corps and units from these people, later deploying most of their male population to invade Ukraine.

One might say, “Okay, well, good luck then, you can handle it on your own, just without our aid.” I don’t think that we will eventually reach that point, but it’s very naive to think that this would bring an end to the war. After all, Ukraine held its defenses and repelled the Russian invasion during the first months without any substantial Western aid. Now, I understand that the situation has changed since then, and the realities on the battleground are different, but even if the frontline collapses in such events, it won’t result in Ukraine simply giving up – instead, it will lead to guerrilla warfare with assassinations, sabotages, and typical methods associated with guerilla warfare.
Europe would end up with a persistent bleeding spot, populated with millions of angry people who feel unjust, radicalized, marginalized, betrayed, and filled with resentment.

Ukraine isn’t fighting this war out of a desire to fight or to seize someone else’s territory or people. Ukraine is compelled to fight by an invader, and realistically, the only means to halt this war is to restrain Russian imperialistic ambitions in Ukraine and Europe at large. Concessions can’t achieve this goal.

Exhibit A:

Putin says Russia and Ukraine "will be reunited, at least at the spiritual level – it's inevitable," meaning Ukraine can't have an identity distinct from Russia's.

Then he says "nationalism poisons many peoples," which from him sounds like "Cocaine is a hell of a drug" pic.twitter.com/AgW39dL8Po

— max seddon (@maxseddon) March 6, 2024

Britain:

UK Defense Minister Grant Shapps has teased confirmation that Iran has supplied Russia with ballistic missiles.

The Defence Secretary all-but confirmed reports of Tehran’s missile shipments in an interview with The House magazine.

“Whether it’s ballistic missiles, or the Shahed drones that they supplied Russia with, we’ve seen that if there’s struggle in the world, often Iran are egging it on, or helping to supply the food chain in this case. They are a bad influence, not just on their region, but in this case in Europe as well,” he said.

Iran officially denied reports last month that it had provided Russia with surface-to-surface ballistic missiles to support Putin’s ongoing war against Ukraine. Iran had supplied around 400 missiles in total to Russia, according to six sources quoted by Reuters. The shipments were said to have included Fateh-110 short-range ballistic weapons, such as the Zolfaghar, which is capable of striking targets at a distance of between 186 and 435 miles.

Speaking to The House, Shapps said there was a limit on what he could divulge about the shipments but gave a clear indication that long-range missiles were included. Sources close to the Defence Secretary did not challenge the inference that the Reuters report was correct.

Iran’s defence ministry and the Revolutionary Guards, which oversees Iran’s ballistic missile programme, declined to comment when news of the deal was initially reported.

According to one source quoted by Reuters, the shipments of missiles began in early January following a deal brokered last year between Iranian and Russian military and security officials in Tehran and Moscow.

One Iranian military official said four shipments of missiles had already been sent, with more coming in the new few weeks. Another senior Iranian official said some of the missiles were flown to Russia by plane, and others sent by ship via the Caspian Sea.

“There will be more shipments,” the second Iranian official said to the news agency. “There is no reason to hide it. We are allowed to export weapons to any country that we wish to.”

Washington, DC:

I’ve just spent a week in Ukraine, mainly between Odesa & Kyiv.

There is serious concern about Congress not passing more aid.

People in DC might think delaying aid is a political game, but here in Ukraine it’s a matter of life or death and national survival. 🚨 WAKE UP!! pic.twitter.com/Dd2DMUSi68

— Luke Coffey (@LukeDCoffey) March 9, 2024

Also, Washington DC:

The New York Times has reported that senior US defense and national security officials are unhappy with how Ukraine is defending itself.

More than two years into their wartime alliance, the bond between the United States and Ukraine is showing signs of wear and tear, giving way to mutual frustration and a feeling that the relationship might be stuck in a bit of a rut.

It is the stuff that often strains relationships — finances, different priorities and complaints about not being heard.

For the Pentagon, the exasperation comes down to a single, recurring issue: American military strategists, including Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III, believe that Ukraine needs to concentrate its forces on one big fight at a time. Instead, President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has vowed to drive Russia out of every inch of Ukraine, expends his forces in battles for towns that U.S. officials say lack strategic value.

The most recent example involved the battle for the eastern city of Avdiivka, which fell to Russia last month. U.S. officials say Ukraine defended Avdiivka too long and at too great a cost.

For its part, Ukraine is increasingly disheartened that American political paralysis has resulted in shortages of ammunition for troops on the front. As each day goes by without a fresh supply of munitions and artillery, and Ukrainian crews ration the shells they have, morale is suffering.

Mr. Zelensky promised a “renewal” of Ukraine’s military in its stagnant campaign against Russia when he dismissed his commanding general, Valery Zaluzhny, last month and named Gen. Oleksandr Syrsky, the head of his ground forces, to replace him.

Gen. Charles Q. Brown, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was on the phone with General Syrsky the next day, as officials in the Biden administration tried to figure out whether they had found an ally in the Ukrainian military for what they see as the most likely route to success.

The jury is still out. Some officials say General Syrsky may be more in sync with Mr. Zelensky than his predecessor.

“Zelensky has made a much more unified chain of command responsive to his leadership as well as advice from outside,” said Senator Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat who heads the Armed Services Committee and recently visited Ukraine.

Two other officials, however, worried whether the new military chief would be willing to push his boss in a direction he did not want to go.

Even now, months after a counteroffensive that failed because Ukraine, in the eyes of the Pentagon, did not take its advice, Kyiv is still too often unwilling to listen.

White House and Ukrainian officials both say that the failure of Congress so far to pass an emergency aid bill including $60.1 billion for Ukraine has already undermined the fight on the ground. The measure would rush badly needed artillery ammunition and air defense interceptors to Ukrainian forces.

But the Ukrainians have other frustrations with the United States. They have frequently complained that the Biden administration has been slow to approve advanced weapons systems that could cross perceived Russian red lines, from fighter jets to long-range missiles.

“We’ve been fiddling while Rome burns,” Emily Harding, a former American intelligence official, said during a Ukraine discussion last month at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “If we had not been dithering early on,” she added, “if we had actually provided the things that we should have provided, we would have been much better off now.”

In the basement of what used to be a small farmhouse, the shock wave of explosions above ground distinctly changed the air pressure in the cramped, cold room, where a Ukrainian soldier was busily adjusting drone equipment.

“The reasons the Russians can advance is because of the lack of ammunition,” said the soldier, who went by the call sign D.J. in keeping with military protocols. He added that he was frustrated by U.S. inaction, attributing the fall of Avdiivka to the United States’ failure to supply aid.

But a Ukrainian commander, who went by the call sign Chef, was far more forgiving. Had it not been for the United States, Ukrainian forces would still be trying to push the Russians out of Kyiv.

Neither the Americans nor the Ukrainians are heading for exit doors. Their commitment remains solid, as each side needs the other. The U.S. intelligence community still provides a substantial amount of real-time information to Ukraine’s military on Russian command posts, ammunition depots and other key nodes in Russian military lines. The Pentagon still hosts monthly Contact Group meetings to prod Ukraine’s partners to provide money, weapons and ammunition.

Perhaps most of all for the Biden administration, Ukraine is hollowing out the army of one of America’s biggest foes.

U.S. estimates put the number of Russian troops killed or wounded since the war started at around a staggering 350,000, according to American officials. Russia has also lost huge amounts of equipment; some 2,200 tanks out of 3,500 have been destroyed along with one-third of its armored vehicles, according to a congressional staff member who saw an intelligence assessment.

Even Russia’s victory in Avdiivka has come with considerable cost: A pro-war Russian military blogger said in a post that Russia had lost 16,000 men and 300 armored vehicles in its assault. (The blogger, Andrei Morozov, deleted the post late last month after what he said was a campaign of intimidation against him. He died the next day.)

“At the end of the day, make no mistake: Even those generals who might be frustrated with Ukraine are at the same time looking at the Russian casualties reports and equipment losses and they’re smiling,” said Dale Buckner, a former Army colonel who is the chief executive of Global Guardian, a U.S.-based security firm.

But Avdiivka was the kind of fight that American war planners would have preferred Ukraine to handle differently.

A former American commander with close ties to the Ukrainian armed forces said there was no reason to hold the city as long as Ukrainian forces did except to bleed Russia of more troops and equipment — sacrifices Moscow was more than willing to accept to claim victory.

Even after it became clear that Russian forces, with larger reinforcements, would prevail, Ukraine held out, rather than conduct a strategic withdrawal, U.S. officials said.

As a result, American frustration levels were high with the Ukrainians, especially Mr. Zelensky and the political leadership, according to a senior Western military official and the former U.S. commander. But the Biden administration has said Mr. Zelensky, as commander in chief, makes the call.

Ultimately, Ukraine’s chaotic retreat was a mistake, the former U.S. commander said. Hundreds of Ukrainian troops may have disappeared or been captured by the advancing Russian units, according to Western officials.

The disagreement over Avdiivka was a mirror image in reverse of Washington’s frustrations with the Ukrainian counteroffensive last summer. In that case, Mr. Austin and other American officials urged Ukraine to focus its assault on one main effort along the 600-mile front line and press to break through Russian fortifications there.

U.S. officials believed that General Zaluzhny had agreed with the American advice but that he could not convince his president. So instead of a single defining fight, Kyiv split up its troops, sending some to the east and some to other fronts, including in the south.

The counteroffensive failed. At the Pentagon, some officials say they do not consider last summer’s efforts to have been a counteroffensive at all.

“We say in the military, when you seek to attack everywhere, you can end up attacking nowhere — because your forces are spread too thin,” said James G. Stavridis, a retired admiral and the former supreme allied commander for Europe. “The Pentagon sees this as a mistake and will continue to offer advice to the Ukrainians along these lines.”

“The U.S. side is frustrated because they give military advice and it doesn’t feel like it’s being taken,” said Evelyn Farkas, a former senior Pentagon official for Ukraine and Russia who is now the executive director of the McCain Institute. “But the Ukrainians don’t like being micromanaged.”

On top of that, Dr. Farkas said, “our political system is shockingly unreliable right now.”

Pentagon officials are still giving advice on the military campaign they would like to see in 2024. Three U.S. military officials said in interviews that the United States wanted Ukraine to concentrate long-range strikes on “putting Crimea at risk,” a phrase that translates into attacking the Russian “land bridge” that traverses southern Ukraine and connects Russia to the Crimean Peninsula, which President Vladimir V. Putin seized in 2014.

Russian troops use the land bridge for resupply and logistics, and it is critical for their efforts in southern Ukraine and Crimea.

But again, Ukrainian frustration with American congressional paralysis is at play.

Western officials and military experts have warned that without U.S. assistance, a cascading collapse along the front is a real possibility this year.

More at the link.

I will remind everyone that the United States has not won a war, nor been able to achieve its strategic objectives in any military operation below the threshold of interstate war, since World War II.

The US’s strategy toward dealing with Russia’s genocidal re-invasion of Ukraine has been too timid by more than half. It has also been inconsistent. That strategy is created by the Biden administration. When you combine the strategic timidity and inconsistency with the Republican bad faith in the Senate and the House, we get where we’re at now. A bunch of US senior military and national security leaders who have never won a war or led US forces in achieving American strategic objectives during any military operation below the threshold of interstate war hectoring Ukraine over the latter not fighting their war of defense the way the former would like all while the promises to never abandon the Ukrainians ring every more hollow.

Speaking of strategic timidity, Germany what you got for us?

German ambassador to UK says “Scholz was being careful about how to increase support to Ukraine, so as not to cause "consequences we all don't want to see"…If Germany were to provide Taurus missiles to Ukraine it would create "potential for escalation"…’ https://t.co/kUtkCKAebF

— Shashank Joshi (@shashj) March 6, 2024

From the BBC: (emphasis mine)

The German ambassador to the UK has said there is “no need to apologise” for security breaches which led to a call between top army officials being leaked by Russian sources.

Miguel Berger told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme one of the participants had likely dialled in via an insecure line.

As a result, Russia was able to intercept the call, he said.

In the audio, officials can be heard discussing details of alleged British operations on the ground in Ukraine.

Mr Berger hit back at criticism by former UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, who said Germany was “pretty penetrated by Russian intelligence” and “neither secure nor reliable”.

“It is extremely unhelpful what Ben Wallace has done,” Mr Berger said.

“This is what Russia wants.”

The publication of the call was a Russian “hybrid attack”, he added.

In the leaked recording, four senior German military officers are seemingly heard discussing the prospect of Ukraine using German-made Taurus cruise missiles to hit the Kerch Bridge, which links Russia to the Crimean peninsula, which was illegally annexed from Ukraine in 2014.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has repeatedly ruled out sending Taurus missiles to Ukraine.

Mr Berger said Mr Scholz was being careful about how to increase support to Ukraine, so as not to cause “consequences we all don’t want to see”.

If Germany were to provide Taurus missiles to Ukraine it would create “potential for escalation”, he said.

The missiles have a range of around 500km (300 miles) – enough to potentially hit Russian territory.

Ambassador Berger said allies’ focus needed to be on supplying enough ammunition to Ukraine.

Kyiv has said it is losing ground to Russian forces in part because of diminishing ammunition supplies.

I’d like to emphasize this part as a best practice:

“I think that is a good lesson for everybody: never use hotel internet if you want to do a secure call,” Mr Berger advised listeners of the Today programme.

Ya think?

The French are rightly concerned:

From French briefings in Munich, though I'm also told they did not rule out the prospect of more serious setbacks.https://t.co/YKFxAzotb3

— Shashank Joshi (@shashj) March 7, 2024

Russia’s information war:

Russia is using social media to wage a war against the West. We're all participants in that war, and we're destroying each other as a result. Forcing Ukraine to capitulate won't stop Moscow⬇️https://t.co/OOHgm3gHv3

— Dr. Ian Garner (@irgarner) March 9, 2024

Dr. Garner writing at Foreign Policy:

A few weeks ago, a Russian autocrat addressed millions of Western citizens in a propaganda event that would have been unthinkable a generation ago—yet is so normal today as to be almost unremarkable. Tucker Carlson’s interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin has now been viewed more than 120 million times on YouTube and X, formerly known as Twitter. Despite the tedium of Putin’s two-hour-long lecture about an imaginary Russian and Ukrainian history, the streaming and promotion of the interview by Western platforms is only the latest successful foray in Russia’s information war against the West, which Moscow is showing every sign of winning. And in this war, the Kremlin is not just weaponizing social media, but relying on Westerners themselves to spread its messages far and wide.

A decade into Russia’s all-out information war, the social media companies seem to have forgotten their promises to act after the 2016 U.S. presidential election interference scandal, when Russian-sponsored posts reached 126 million Americans on Facebook alone. Policymakers not only seem oblivious to the full breadth and scope of Russia’s information war, but fears about stifling freedom of speech and contributing to political polarization have led them and the social media companies to largely refrain from any action to stop Russia’s ongoing campaign.

This inaction comes amid growing signs of Russian influence operations that have deeply penetrated Western politics and society. Dozens—if not hundreds or more—of Russian agents have been observed everywhere from English towns to Canadian universities. Many of these agents are low-level and appear to achieve little individually, but occasionally they penetrate institutions, companies, and governments. Meanwhile, a flood of money props up Moscow’s ambitions, including hundreds of millions of dollars the Kremlin is pouring into influencing elections, with some of that money covertly (and overtly) funneled to political parties and individual politicians. For many decades, Western societies have been deluged with every sort of influence imaginable.

While there have been some countermeasures since the start of Russia’s latest war—including the United States and European Union shutting off access to Russian media networks such as RT and Sputnik in early 2022—these small, ineffective steps are the equivalent of information war virtue signaling. They do not fundamentally change Western governments’ lack of any coherent approach to the many vectors of Russian disinformation and hybrid warfare. At the very moment when Kremlin narratives on social media are beginning to seriously undermine support for Ukraine, Western governments’ handle on the disinformation crisis seems to be getting weaker by the day.

For Putin’s Russia, “information-psychological warfare”—as a Russian military textbook calls it—is intended to “erode the morale and psychological spirit” of an enemy population. A central aspect of a wider war against the West, it is conducted online through relentless barrages of fake, real, and misrepresented news, through a cultivated network of witting and unwitting shills such as Carlson. The Kremlin’s messaging has an extraordinary reach: In the first year of the Ukraine war alone, posts by Kremlin-linked accounts were viewed at least 16 billion times by Westerners. Every one of those views is part of a full-spectrum attack against the West designed not just to undermine support for Ukraine, but to actively damage Western democratic systems.

Moscow launches its attacks using a playbook familiar to anyone who watched the disinformation campaigns linked to the 2014 invasion of Crimea and the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Bots, trolls, targeted ad campaigns, fake news organizations, and doppelganger accounts of real Western politicians and pundits spread stories concocted in Moscow—or in St. Petersburg, where then-Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin ran an army of trolls posting on Western social media. If the specific technologies are new, Russia’s strategy of information warfare is not. During World War II, Soviet propagandist Ilya Ehrenburg memorably described the pen as “a weapon made not for anthologies, but for war.” From the early Bolshevik era to the end of the Cold War, his peers spent decades spreading disinformation abroad in hopes that countries targeted by Russia would be unable to “defend … themselves, their family, their community, and their country,” as Soviet journalist turned defector Yuri Bezmenov put it.

What is undoubtedly new is a polarized Western public’s enthusiasm for re-centering its own identity around Moscow’s narratives—and becoming an unwitting weapon in the information war. Take, for example, the QAnon movement, whose supporters have long gathered critical energy from talking points supplied and amplified by Moscow through social media. QAnon supporters espouse a range of grievances familiar from Russian propaganda: anti-LGBTQ+, anti-liberal, and especially anti-Ukraine sentiments. QAnon channels on the messaging app Telegram, for example, rapidly turned into fora for anti-Ukraine and pro-war sentiment.

While ordinary users are certain that they are merely speaking their minds, a domestic policy issue has ultimately turned into a vehicle for Moscow to exert influence over national security decisions. QAnon support has spread from the United States to countries across the West—and each group of adherents, regardless of location and platform, seems to espouse the same pro-Putin sentiments and the same skepticism about providing support for Ukraine.

Such phenomena are all too familiar, whether they relate to the U.S. presidential election influence scandal, to the constant reiteration of Moscow’s talking points about NATO, or to the web of useful idiots—from quasi-journalists to rappers—who seem to function as mouthpieces for the Kremlin by consistently spreading favorable narratives under the guise of asking questions or presenting two sides of a story.

Moscow also exploits non-Western networks, such as Telegram and TikTok, to its own advantage. Today, 14 percent of adult Americans regularly consume news from Chinese-owned TikTok, where thousands of fake accounts spread Russian talking points—and where Russian propagandists can count hundreds of thousands of followers. TikTok has occasionally revealed Russian bot networks, but its efforts to stop the spread of Kremlin-aligned content have been lackluster and ineffective. Millions of Americans hoover up material created by Moscow’s propagandists, bonding with influencers and other users who also share this material, constantly propagating Moscow’s viewpoint on Ukraine. TikTok’s unwillingness to cooperate on countering such disinformation has left U.S. lawmakers with little choice but to mull an outright ban of the network—and even then, that would largely be over China-related concerns, not because lawmakers recognize the crucial role TikTok plays for the Kremlin.

Even where they ostensibly have more control, U.S. policymakers have been unwilling to do much to stem the tide of pro-Russian propaganda. Since Elon Musk took over Twitter and renamed it X, the network has all but openly welcomed Russian influence campaigns onto its servers. The platform even hosts Kremlin-aligned neo-fascists such as Alexander Dugin, who uses it to spread his apocalyptic vision of the war in Ukraine to his 180,000 followers, including via discussion spaces in English. Hundreds of accounts—many belonging to ordinary Westerners—boost Dugin’s reach (and that of similar figures) by following him as well as liking or commenting on posts. X’s streaming and promotion of the Carlson interview and Musk’s own echoing of Russian talking points—such as highly specific claims about Ukraine using phrasing normally employed only by Russian officials—have come in for heavy criticism. But just as damaging are the smaller communities created around figures such as Dugin, where Western users do much to spread an anti-Ukraine message.

If anything, there are signs that governments are taking Russia’s influence campaigns less seriously today than in the past. The British government first stymied the release of a damning report on Russian interference in British politics—and once the report was released, it did little to act on the findings. In Washington, the Biden administration is scaling back its efforts to head off Russian disinformation. Flummoxed by a barrage of criticism reflecting freedom of speech concerns, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security shuttered its Disinformation Governance Board in August 2022, even as Americans were being barraged by an unprecedented wave of pro-war and anti-Ukraine propaganda on social media. Since then, the U.S. State Department’s parsimonious funding has chiefly gone to small-scale nongovernmental organizations offering fact-checking and disinformation tracking services—a drop in the bucket at best.

When Western governments do address foreign hybrid threats, such as cybersecurity and election interference, they are increasingly focused on China. And invariably, they still identify such threats merely as “influence” or “interference,” rather than as part of a larger, concerted military effort. Their responses thus mistakenly circumscribe Russia’s hybrid warfare as a discrete, restricted, and targeted policy of disruption. In reality, it is an ongoing, fluid, and broad phenomenon that invites continued violence.

There is much, much more at the link!

Taganrog, Rostov Oblast, Russia:

Interesting details about the UAVs that attacked Taganrog in the Russian part of the special military operation zone last night. Appear to be similar to Shaheds. Difficult to intercept. pic.twitter.com/gNfft5Y0s3

— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated) March 9, 2024

/1. At night there was a drone attack on Taganrog, Russia. The attack was most likely carried out on an airport/factory where a Russian A-50 had previously been spotted. A-50 was spotted on the satellite imagery published by @cxemu and appeared on the airfield between 28-29th of… pic.twitter.com/YN1ZlpMiqW

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) March 9, 2024

/3. The Taganrog is located 140km from the frontline. Well in range of Storm Shadow/SCALP missiles. But as we see, for well-known reasons, the Russians feel quite comfortable to place such important and limiting equipment as the A-50 there. pic.twitter.com/8OB4e7Isyq

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) March 9, 2024

/5. The damaged area is located closer to the hangars gates.
Plus some photos of how the targeted hangar looks like. pic.twitter.com/TnhxfbMb0a

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) March 9, 2024

Tatarigami and his Frontelligence Insight team have a new assessment for us to ponder. First tweet from the thread, the rest from the Thread Reader App:

The Frontelligence Insight conducted a visual analysis of satellite imagery to assess the impact of a Ukrainian UAV attack on an aircraft repair facility in Taganrog, The imagery indeed validates the damage sustained by the facility.

Don't forget to like and share!

🧵Thread: pic.twitter.com/JEcA4wAN1y

— Tatarigami_UA (@Tatarigami_UA) March 9, 2024

2/ A comparative analysis shows scorch marks on the roof of a building identified by our team as a Final Assembly Facility, where it was suspected Russians were conducting A-50 repairs. The day before the attack:

3/ Notably, the A-50 is absent in the imagery from March 8th and March 9th, leaving uncertainty about its presence in the airfield during the operation. Earlier images, disclosed by investigative journalists at @cxemu, showed an A-50 parked near the hangar on February 29th.

4/ If the drones managed to penetrate the roof, the payload in drones would be enough to cause damage to equipment, and aircraft inside. However, there are no visual indications of a significant fire inside the hangar, making it challenging to assess the extent of the damage 

5/ Further satellite imagery analysis shows that at least one S-300/400 battery was present at the airfield during the attack. Unless it serves as a decoy, this suggests the Ukrainian UAV’s ability to penetrate Russian air defense systems, even in proximity to strategic objects

6/ In summary, our team recognizes that the destruction or damage of the A-50 can’t be definitively concluded from this. Nonetheless, this remains a significant achievement for Ukraine due to the ability to bypass AD and target an important facility within Russian territory. 

7/ Consider supporting us through BuyMeaCoffee, as our expenses rely solely on your public support. As the war continues, public financial support is decreasing as well.

Tatarigami_UA is All Source Public IntelligenceSatellite imagery and other expenses https://buymeacoffee.com/frontelligence

Goryachy Klyuch, Krasnodar Krai, Russia:

They're going to put up a monument to Prigozhin and Utkin. They still remember them fondly.

But do they remember who killed them? pic.twitter.com/K1kmMnDbES

— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated) March 9, 2024

That’s enough for tonight.

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— Patron (@PatronDsns) March 8, 2024

Open thread!