Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

When we show up, we win.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You cannot shame the shameless.

All hail the time of the bunny!

If you are still in the gop, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

Celebrate the fucking wins.

I have other things to bitch about but those will have to wait.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

Let there be snark.

Sometimes the world just tells you your cat is here.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Anne Laurie is a fucking hero in so many ways. ~ Betty Cracker

When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.

We will not go back.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

If rights aren’t universal, they are privilege, not rights.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Roe is not about choice. It is about freedom.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / War for Ukraine Day 970: Two Thirds of Ukraine Is Under Air Raid Alert Because Russia Is Attacking with Glide Bombs and a Drone Swarm

War for Ukraine Day 970: Two Thirds of Ukraine Is Under Air Raid Alert Because Russia Is Attacking with Glide Bombs and a Drone Swarm

by | 24 Comments

This post is in: , , , , , , ,

Painting by NEIVANMADE. It has a white background an in the center are Soldiers in green doing air defense by firing at incoming Russian missiles in the upper right. The missiles are red and yellow. In the upper left, written in green, is the text: "SAVE THE BRAVEST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD!" Below the Soldiers, also written in green, is "SUPPORT FOR KHARKIV"

(Image by NEIVANMADE)

Two quick housekeeping notes. First, Rosie is doing great, as is Ruby. Rosie’s last treatment is tomorrow, so more to follow. Thank you all for the good thoughts, well wishes, prayers, and donations.

Second, I’m fried. It has been a very long, very draining two weeks. I’m just going to run through the basics tonight so I can rack out.

Russia has been attacking Ukraine with glide bombs and a drone swarm for several hours.

The butcher’s bill from the past week:

Every day, Russia strikes our cities and communities. This is the enemy’s deliberate terror against our people.

This week alone, Russian terrorists have used more than 20 missiles of various types, around 800 guided aerial bombs, and over 500 strike drones of different types against Ukraine.

A world united in defense can stand up to this deliberate terror. Ukraine needs more air defense systems and long-range capabilities. I am grateful to all partners who understand this and support us.

Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump.

This Week, We Secured Support From Our Partners in Terms of the Victory Plan – Address by the President

20 October 2024 – 20:50

I wish you health, fellow Ukrainians!

Briefly about this day.

First, I want to acknowledge all our defenders of the skies who shoot down “Shahed” drones every night. This year – nearly every night, and sometimes in the mornings and during the day – we face the threat of “Shahed” drones. The strike drones given to Russia by Iran. They’ve become one of the main tools of Russian terror against Ukraine. And, unfortunately, the Russians and Iranians continue to improve them. We have always told our partners that it is necessary to be more decisive in countering such criminal alliances. Just this week, from Monday until today, there have been “Shaheds” every day. On October 18th alone, there were 129 of these drones. And since the beginning of the year, Russia has already used over 6,130 “Shaheds.” Our warriors manage to shoot down a significant portion of them. Electronic warfare systems help a lot, but not with everything. That’s why there needs to be more pressure on Russia’s ability to already produce these weapons. We need the capability to destroy not only the storage bases for the “Shaheds” but also the entire infrastructure for their production and logistics. Unfortunately, terrorists know how to take advantage of the time that the free world’s indecision gives them.

Similarly, there is now a new threat – the criminal alliance between Russia and North Korea. I am grateful to the leaders and representatives of nations who are not turning a blind eye and are speaking openly about this cooperation aimed at increasing the scale of the war. About the weapons being supplied from North Korea to Russia. About what Russia might give Pyongyang in return for this assistance. Unfortunately, the instability and threats could grow significantly once North Korea starts learning the peculiarities of modern warfare. Now we have clear evidence that people are being supplied to Russia from North Korea, and these are not just workers for industries, but also military personnel. And we expect a normal, honest, strong reaction from our partners to this. In fact, this is another state joining the war against Ukraine. Everyone has the opportunity to see the evidence – both through satellites and through the video that is already coming from Russia. This must be addressed. There must be a response. We must counter this. We cannot let evil grow. If the world remains silent now, and if we end up facing North Korean soldiers on the front lines as regularly as we are defending against “Shaheds,” it will benefit no one in the world and will only prolong this war. A war that must be ended justly and as soon as possible.

And one more thing.

This week, we secured support from our partners in terms of the Victory Plan – thank you to France, Lithuania, our Nordic partners, and many other allies in the European Union. We’ve also received very positive signals from the United States – we are hearing changes in rhetoric. We are expecting a visit from a team from Washington, so that we can work on the points of the Victory Plan at all operational levels. We’ve agreed on several new support packages, both for defense and energy. This is not easy for us to achieve, but there is no other way to defeat the enemy. I am grateful to everyone who is helping. We must continue working together, in unity, to achieve results for all of us – for all of Ukraine. However, while this is happening, unfortunately, there are things going on here, in the rear of Ukraine, that make external enemies seem unnecessary. This is truly an internal enemy. What’s happening with the Medical and Social Expert Commissions and the audacity of certain individuals – particularly prosecutors – who used their connections with the MSECs to obtain fake disability statuses. I expect swift and decisive action from law enforcement, especially from the Security Service of Ukraine, the State Bureau of Investigation, and the Prosecutor General’s Office. I have scheduled a meeting of the National Security and Defense Council.

Glory to Ukraine!

Kupiansk:

The Kurakhove front:

Here’s the full text of Miller’s tweet:

Some very concerning advances by Russian forces in key frontline areas. Fighting in the Kurakhove sector is especially tough and a worrisome pocket formed there. Chasiv Yar gains after months of static have brought Russian troops just 8km from Kostyantynivka, down the main T-0504 hwy.

The Kursk cross border offensive:

Kharkiv Oblast:

Here’s the full text of the tweet above:

This often goes unnoticed, but imagine finding yourself near the frontline in your 70s when you can’t just go and build yourself a new life elsewhere.
Instead of enjoying their golden years in their home, these people had to choose between fleeing into poverty and homelessness or staying to protect what remained of their lives.
They chose to stay, and russia murdered them

And the full text of the quoted tweet:

The bodies of a 71-year-old man and 72-year-old woman were discovered beneath the rubble of a damaged residential building in Novoplatonivka, Kharkiv region, the Kharkiv Regional Military Administration reported. Russian forces struck the village with an aerial bomb around 3:15 PM today.

Russia kills people i the Kharkiv region every single day.

Zaporizhzhia Oblast:

Kryvyi Rih:

Odesa:

Tblisi, Georgia:

Moldova:

From the BBC:

The sniffer dogs at Chisinau Airport have been working extra hard in recent months, searching for money that might be evidence of Russian meddling in Moldovan politics.

Ami, a black retriever, gives every suitcase that rolls in on the baggage claim belts a good sniff on all sides. If she detects cash, she will freeze. Back in May she was doing that a lot.

That is when customs officers began finding large amounts of money on passengers arriving via connecting flights from Moscow. People who had never left Moldova before were returning from a few days in Russia with wads of notes.

“Almost everyone had money: 2,000, 3,000, 7,000 euros”, the head of customs at Chisinau Airport, Ruslan Alexandrov, remembers. The amounts themselves were not illegal but the patterns were suspicious.

“There were certain flights: Moscow-Istanbul-Chisinau, Moscow-Yerevan-Chisinau,” the customs chief explains. “Normally people don’t come in with that much money. Not from Moscow.”

So police and prosecutors began seizing the cash. In one day alone they say they scooped $1.5m (£1.2m). No-one ever asked for their money back.

The authorities believe the cash mules were part of a major and ongoing operation to buy political influence run by a fugitive Moldovan oligarch named Ilan Shor. Convicted of major fraud in Chisinau, he is now resident in Russia which will not extradite him.

Ahead of two key votes this weekend, the capital’s airport is on alert. Flights from all “high risk” routes are met by sniffer dogs and at least half the passengers are pulled over for extra baggage scans.

On Sunday, President Maia Sandu is running for re-election on a staunchly pro-EU platform, challenged by 10 other candidates. Many are openly sympathetic to Moscow; some see Moldova as a “bridge”.

Voters will also get to cast their ballot in a referendum on whether to enshrine Moldova’s goal of EU accession in the constitution. In fact, membership talks have already begun but the country has been in a battle over its political direction for decades, ever since Moldova gained independence from Moscow as the Soviet Union fell apart.

That East-West tug has intensified since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. President Sandu – a former World Bank economist first elected on a promise to clean up corruption – then steered Moldova much more sharply towards the West. She began to openly identify Vladimir Putin’s Russia as a major security threat.

The Kremlin denies playing any role in Chisinau politics, but officials here accuse Russia of operating via proxies to disrupt and destabilise the country.

“I’m not aware of anywhere else where we’ve seen such a brazen and open attempt to corrupt an election,” Moldova’s chief anti-corruption prosecutor, Veronica Dragalin, told me this week in her office in Chisinau.

Born in Moldova, she spent most of her life in the US – most recently as a prosecutor in Los Angeles – before returning to the country and a job in a small office on the fifth floor of a Soviet-era block with a broken lift.

What her team say they have uncovered, working with police, is a pyramid payments scheme openly run from Russia by Ilan Shor and his group.

“We’re talking about a foreign country sending money in an attempt to influence the election,” Ms Dragalin spells it out. She details evidence gained through wiretaps, police infiltrators and witnesses – some of which her office has made public.

“At the start they tried to make it look legitimate. Now it’s almost like they’re flagrantly flaunting all the laws… [and] openly influencing the decision to vote,” the prosecutor says.

“The primary goal is to have the referendum fail.”

According to her team, once the cash couriers were detected at the airport and that route made more difficult, payments began to be channelled via a sanctioned Russian bank, PSB.

By early October as many as 130,000 voters had received payment through this scheme – about 10% of the active electorate, according to Viorel Cernauteanu, the chief of police.

“In September alone, $15m (£12m) was transferred,” he told me, explaining how they could trace funds and recipients because they gave personal data to open a bank account.

Offering money or goods in return for votes is a crime with a possible five-year jail sentence. Last month, a new law made it an administrative offence to accept money, too.

But in one of Europe’s poorest countries it is not hard to find willing recipients of cash.

Much more at the link!

Ultra high net worth individual (oligarch) in a series of legal disputes, both criminal and civil, suddenly pumps obscene amounts of cash into a national election in a very public manner. Seems somewhat familiar, but I can’t quite place it. I’m sure it’ll come to me later.

Bloomberg has the details:

Moldovans were on track to clear a key hurdle toward joining the European Union in a set of votes on Sunday that may help break the Kremlin’s decades-long grip on the country.

More than 32% of voters participated in a referendum to join the EU as of 3 p.m. local time on Sunday, just shy of a one-third threshold required to validate the ballot, the country’s Central Electoral Commission said. The nation is also holding a presidential election, in which Maia Sandu is favored to win a second term.

The stakes are high in the former Soviet republic as the pro-EU government faced what it called an unprecedented effort to thwart vote in a coordinated campaign. Polls show a majority of Moldovans favor EU accession as well as a new term for Sandu as she seeks to steer the country into the EU by the end of the decade.

“I voted today for Moldovans to be able to decide their own fate, not anyone else,” Sandu said as she cast a ballot in the capital Chisinau. “Not based on the lies and the dirty money, but only the will of the people,” she added.

One of Europe’s poorest nations, Moldova began EU accession talks this year after securing candidacy status alongside Ukraine in 2022. Sandu’s government has pledged to overhaul the nation’s justice system and bolster the economy to become a member by 2030.

But Russia, which has dominated Moldova’s energy resources and political system since the collapse of the Soviet Union, has sought to block the country’s Western path. With the US and EU accusing Moscow of meddling in the elections, the chief Moldovan negotiator with the EU this week said Moscow had pumped some €100 million ($109 million) into an effort to disrupt the votes.Police in the country reported 75 incidents of disruption as of 3:30pm, including efforts to transport or bribe voters, photographing ballots, intimidation and scuffling.

The Kremlin “categorically rejects” allegations that it’s interfering in Moldova’s electoral process, spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday, according to the state-run Tass news service.

Success for the referendum, which would anchor Moldova’s bid in the nation’s constitution, would be a boon to Sandu, a 52-year-old former World Bank official who has led Moldova since 2020 with an agenda to extricate the country from Moscow’s orbit and integrate it into the West.

A procession of EU leaders has visited Chisinau in recent weeks, including Chancellor Olaf Scholz in August and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week. Sandu may face one of her pro-Kremlin opponents in a second round of voting on Nov. 3 if no candidate on Sunday receives more than 50% of the vote.

More at the link.

Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia:

That’s enough for tonight.

Your daily Patron!

There are no new Patron tweets or videos today. Here is some adjacent material.

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

24Comments

  2. 2.

    J. Arthur Crank

    Thanks Adam. I am happy to hear that you have power and water available from the intended sources (e.g. not floodwaters).

    Ami, a black retriever, gives every suitcase that rolls in on the baggage claim belts a good sniff on all sides. If she detects cash, she will freeze. Back in May she was doing that a lot.

    I am always amazed on how dogs can be trained to do these very specific tasks. I saw a bit years ago about a German shepherd who would sniff people for large amounts of cash. He was trained to only signal if the amount of the cash was large, so people who carried a few to several bills would not be stopped.

    I wonder if the dogs have to be trained to sniff money from different countries separately (e.g. Euros vs. Rubles).

  3. 3.

    Yarrow

    Thanks, Adam.

    Apologies if this was posted here before:

    Radio Free Europe was once created to break Soviet censorship. Industrialists like Ford and Rockefeller were co-founders. It is paid for by the US Congress.

    Now, Apple is blocking Radio Free Europe in Russia at the request of the Kremlin.https://t.co/7Q3ygJg8ta— Janis Kluge (@jakluge) October 20, 2024

    Western companies refuse to take Russia’s threat seriously. Tim Apple needs to wake tf up.

  4. 4.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Nukular Biskits: Yep. Got home WED mid afternoon. Power was restored TUES evening. Got the fridge and freezer situations, which was the only real issues we had with the power being out for 6 days, solved FRI morning.

    We were very, very, very lucky.

    Thank you for asking.

  12. 12.

    Adam L Silverman

    I’m fading fast, so I’m going to grab a shower and go to bed.

    AlaskaReader: you are most welcome!

  16. 16.

    Jay

    (((Tendar)))
    @Tendar
    Oct 19
    While the North Korean intervention in Russia’s war against Ukraine exposed once again Western appeasement, it overshadowed something much more important. The Republic of Korea (South Korea) is a military and technological power house. Seoul always observes what the hostile neighbor in the North does and unlike the West, South Korea is for obvious reasons fully devoted in its cold war thinking process.

    What that means can be summarized quite easily. Whatever North Korea does, it will be countered with a South Korean gambit. Seoul fully understands that a Russian win in Ukraine would mean a North Korean win. This won’t be accepted in Seoul and unlike many other countries, South Korea has the means to do so. The list of potential weapons, which can be used to help Ukraine, is longer than Putin’s table. From artillery shells and systems, over air defense assets and MLRS up to equipment for electronic warfare, everything what is needed for the war in Ukraine can be procured and especially produced in serial production in South Korea. Several countries such as Poland, Norway, Finland, Indonesia and more are lining up to get their hands on South Korean hardware, such as the K9 Thunder, and thanks to the fact that South Korea never left the Cold War, it maintained an industry which is capable of serial production while keeping up to technological edge. This enables South Korea to offer advanced military hardware for a lower price.

    As mentioned in my post yesterday, Putin is tacticians, but a lousy strategist. His alliance with North Korea comes out of desperation. Almost half of all fired Russian artillery shells are originally from North Korea, and their quality is abysmal. For North Korea this alliance is much more beneficial. But it comes for a huge price, for both. South Korea will certainly not sit idle and will move against this unholy alliance. This means that Ukraine and South Korea will get closer. The war in Ukraine offers for South Korea’s military industry and unique opportunity to test their weapon systems, which already are considered one of the best in the world.

    So watch this space for what is about to come, and soon.

    https://nitter.poast.org/Tendar/status/1847758234486239338#m

  17. 17.

    Jay

    Anton Gerashchenko
    @Gerashchenko_en
    14h
    As I wrote in the summer, this fall and winter will be very difficult. Yes, things are consistently bad. But the key word here is not ‘bad,’ but ‘consistently.’ We have not been defeated, our allies have not abandoned us, the frontline has not been broken through, our military industry continues to work and develop, the enemy has not captured a single regional center, logistics is functioning, air defense defends cities, the military command maintains control, the parliament is working, volunteers are working, taxes are being paid, Russian oil and weapons depots are burning, wheat is being harvested and bread is being baked daily, trolleybuses are running, and the third year of the great war is underway.

    Russians are now doing everything they can to make Ukrainian society collapse. Russia is counting on swaying public opinion:

    1️⃣ In the West – convince the West to stop supporting Ukraine;
    2️⃣ In Ukraine – to convince Ukrainians to stop fighting for their independence, believing that the West has abandoned Ukraine.

    Naturally, Russia is trying to use its entire propaganda machine, which it has built all over the world, spending huge amounts of money, to achieve these goals.

    Everyone in Ukraine understands that for us, defeat means not peace under Russian influence but Bucha and Mariupol all over the country, Gulags and prisons where Ukrainians will die of torture and starvation. Putin does not need Ukrainians. He wants a total genocide.

    That is why we are uniting. We are waiting for results of the US elections. We support our defense industry, and it is gaining momentum.

    It is important to hold on and stand firm.
    To not sink into despair, to not give up, to not spread panic. To not blame allies. To help each other. Mentally prepare ourselves for the fact that things will likely get even harder and we will have to endure it.

    We can do it. I believe in it.

    https://nitter.poast.org/Gerashchenko_en/status/1847956540751290531#m

  19. 19.

    wjca

    If South Korea decides to weigh in, they could become a base for Ukrainian drones hitting the ships queued to unload NK munitions in Russian harbors.  Probably some dodge to maintain plausible deniability for doing so.  For Ukraine,  seems like a useful bottleneck in the munitions suoply chain.

  20. 20.

    Jay

    @wjca:

    So far, South Korean aid to Ukraine has only been humanitarian aid.

    As a major arms manufacturer with massive defense stock, South Korea’s first move would probably be weapons and ammo.

  22. 22.

    Sister Inspired Revolver of Freedom

    The Perun video last week was all about Korea’s Biggest Defence Exhibition. I gave it a miss which, of course, I now regret. This week’s is all about the Exploding Pagers & Hezbollah vs Israel. I simply haven’t had the time to watch it, but he’s always good.

  23. 23.

    YY_Sima Qian

    On the topic of reported PRC transfer of lethal weapons to Russia (my WAG is engineering prototypes of the Shahed-like suicide drones or longer range drones that can drop explosive payloads, that the Russian MIC has contracted one or more companies in the PRC to develop, being field tested in Russia), here is what Shashank Joshi of the Economist is reporting:

    I asked a senior NATO official about this. They said: “we still don’t see actual weapons from China going into Russia.” They said they could not confirm any transfer let alone one approved by the Chinese government. Doesn’t mean reports are wrong, just that it isn’t clear cut.

    The NATO official also said they couldn’t corroborate South Korean intel reports of DPRK troops. Said small numbers (“handful”) might be observing use of N Korean arms but “when it comes to large numbers certainly nothing we’ve seen” on large movements “west towards the front”

    …

    I don’t think that’s it at all. I think they know that if they come out with low confidence judgments in public then their credibility will be hurt over time. It’s not as if they’ve been anything other than clear & concerned over China’s critical enabling role in Ru def industry

    Not the 1st time we have seen conflicting/contradictory reporting & assessment out of the US & the UK wrt the PRC transferring lethal weapons to Russia.

  24. 24.

    YY_Sima Qian

    OT: Interesting development along the Himalayas:

    India and China have agreed on disengagement, patrolling arrangements along LAC: Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri
    Last month, the Chinese Defence Ministry said China and India were able to “reduce differences” and build “some consensus” on disengaging troops from friction points.
    Written by Shubhajit Roy

    New Delhi | Updated: October 21, 2024 18:24 IST

    …

    Lowering the temperature along the Sino-Indian border is a good thing. I do hope the two sides have made progress toward reaching a common understanding of the Line of Actual Control in the Aksai Chin region. As I recall one senior Indian diplomat succinctly put it:”there is no single LAC, there is the LAC pre-’62, there is the PRC understanding of the LAC post-’62, & there is the Indian understanding of the LAC post-’62,” & both parties also act on their own suspicion of the other party’s understanding of the post-’62 LAC. Also a reminder that India, whether under the BJP or Congress, will always act to advance its own self-interest, & will not be anyone (be they the US, the PRC or Russia) else’s pawn in grand geopolitical contests.

Comments are closed.