Dispatch for August 16

The Washington Post published an article titled “Road to war: U.S. struggled to convince allies, and Zelensky, of risk of invasion”. It tells how the national intelligence services found out that Putin is going to invade Ukraine and tried to convince everyone of this while not disclosing too much data (to keep their sources out of danger). As a result, even among the NATO officials many did not believe it, except for Great Britain and the Baltic states. And the Ukrainian government, in absence of specific data on the directions of the invasion, had to avoid causing panic which could lead to an economic collapse even before the attack and so, to a quick defeat. The article also highlights unsuccessful negotiations with the Russian Foreign Ministry and troubles in the Russian army (most commanders thought it would be an exercise on the border rather than a preparation for a real invasion).

Additional independent confirmation appeared, that the first units of Russia’s newly-formed Third Army Corps will be sent to the frontline in no less than a week from now, however, we note that transportation of such formations takes a long time- between several weeks to a month. In addition, combat readiness of the corps’ personnel leaves much to be desired, as many people signed the short-term contract with the Ministry of Defense exclusively for the purpose of the lump-sum advance payment. There are also acute concerns over the lack of commanders and officers, including junior positions. 

We believe that the 3rd Army Corps is capable of strengthening the Russian offensive on a single axis, but it will not be able to drastically change the situation, much less open a new front.

Based upon the geolocation of new video footage showing pro-Russian combatants, it is apparent that Pisky has indeed fallen under control of pro-Russian forces.

We believe that these forces will continue advancing north in the direction of villages of Vodyane and Opytne in order to accomplish a partial encirclement of Avdiivka.

A night-time video shows a Russian bombardment of Sloviansk, probably with cluster munitions deployed by MLRS.

A video emerged showing two simultaneous launches of Tochka-U missiles by the Ukrainian forces. 

Oryx, a website documenting equipment losses based on visual open-source evidence, reports that Russia has lost more than 50 attack and transport helicopters since it began this invasion.

There's information that the administrator of the pro-Wagner channel "Grey Zone", known as 500, call sign "White", was killed by the strike in Popasna. We don't have confirmation yet, but there have been no new posts on the channel since August 13, although previously there were posts every day.

British instructors train UAF (Ukrainian Armed Forces) soldiers in south-eastern England.

Former US ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, in an interview with Russia’s independent TVRain channel, suggested an idea of exit duties for Russians, which could go to the rebuilding of Ukraine.

It's also desirable to find a rapid resolution of the issue of the Russian Central Bank's seized reserves and their allocation for reparations.

According to Vladimir Soloviev, the head of the Krasnodar city government will soon head the government of the occupied Kherson region. Two anonymous sources at the Krasnodar City Hall confirmed this information to the Kavkaz.Realii media outlet.

Propaganda newspapers are being handed out in Mariupol. T-shirts “For Greater Russia” (Zа большую Россию), which we reported on in one of the previous dispatches, are also present. They show a map on which the territory of Russia includes Alaska, Kazakhstan, parts of Poland and Finland, Alaska (US state).

The head of Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov, is now being reminded of his statement from February 20th that “not a single shell, not a single mine, not a single bullet has hit and will not hit the territory of Crimea.”

Error correction

The tail of the Smerch MLRS rocket was installed at Svoboda Square in Kharkiv in 2015 as an art object. It was brought from the Donbas as a symbol of Russian aggression, and it isn’t a result of one of the recent shellings of Kharkiv.