Things quiet down in Bakhmut due to the rotation of Wagner troops out of the area and new Russian troop rotating in….
Ukraine troops think they will be able to deal better the Russian troops …
The war is coming to more Russian back home with possible extra work by ‘sacrifices’ wanted by Putin in working….(Remember this IS BIG Russia only fighting the Ukraine?)
Wagner Troops ARE leaving Bakhmut…..
It was not so different from what they have been doing for weeks. But soldiers here cited one big change.
“The Wagner guys have left and the [regular Russians] have come in,” said a 26-year-old commander who asked to be identified by his call sign, Chichen. He used an anti-Russian ethnic slur to refer to the troops who appear to be replacing the mercenaries, including convicts recruited directly from prisons, who led Russia’s months-long onslaught….
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If confirmed, the rotation of forces would mark a major shift, making units under the Russian military’s regular command responsible for holding the city — and allowing Wagner leader Yevgeniy Prigozhin to pull away after claiming to have achieved the only big territorial gain for the Kremlin since last summer.
Moving regular Russian units to defend Bakhmut could create vulnerabilities at other locations along the front, which stretches hundreds of miles — weaknesses that Ukraine might try to exploit as it seeks to snatch back occupied territory in a counteroffensive that could begin at any moment.
After declaring Bakhmut fully under Russian control, Prigozhin quickly announced his forces would leave beginning on Thursday, but his motivations and true plans have been difficult to discern….
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Russian’s drop a shitload of drones on the Ukraine….
Explosions echoed across Ukraine’s capital for hours before dawn on Sunday as air defense teams raced to combat the largest swarm of Russian attack drones targeting Kyiv since the war began more than 15 months ago.
The Ukrainian Air Force said it had shot down 58 out of 59 Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones aimed at targets in central Ukraine, describing the number launched as a record. More than 40 drones were intercepted over the capital, where city officials said at least one person had been killed and another injured, probably by falling debris.
As Ukraine draws closer to launching a counteroffensive aimed at reclaiming land lost in the first months of the war, Moscow has stepped up its assaults on Kyiv. The capital has been attacked 14 times this month by waves of Russian drones, cruise missiles and sophisticated ballistic missiles.
“This was the largest-ever drone attack on the capital since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, particularly using Shahed loitering munitions,” the Kyiv military administration said in a statement….
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Here’s the latest on the war and its ripple effects across the globe.
- Overnight, 54 Iranian-made drones attacked Ukraine — a record, according to Ukraine’s armed forces. The country’s air force destroyed 52 of those, it said.
- Ukrainian forces shot down 36 drones in the Kyiv region, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Sunday evening. That tally is slightly lower than a preliminary report from the capital city’s military administration. The Washington Post could not immediately verify specifics. The capital region has experienced more than a dozen attacks this month, according to officials. The latest assault came as Kyiv, one of Ukraine’s oldest cities, prepares to celebrate the anniversary of its founding 1,541 years ago.
- Russian President Vladimir Putin urged security officials stationed near combat zones and in occupied areas of Ukraine to “ensure fast movement of both military and civil vehicles and cargoes … on their way to new constituent entities of the Russian Federation” — referring to Ukrainian regions that the Kremlin illegally claimed to annex last year. Putin’s remarks came during an address Sunday honoring border guards.
- Recent dry weather after an unusually rainy start to the spring is raising expectations that Ukraine’s counteroffensive is or soon will be underway. Experts told The Post that ground conditions are one factor under consideration, given that numerous Russian tanks and other heavy vehicles became bogged down in mud early in the invasion.
- Ukrainians fighting outside Bakhmut reported seeing Russian mercenaries withdrawing from the eastern city. That could signal a shift in command, with Yevgeniy Prigozhin’s Wagner Group — which spearheaded a costly battle to occupy Bakhmut — handing over the responsibility of holding on to the city to Russia’s regular military command, The Post reports.
- Ukraine’s deputy defense minister, Hanna Maliar, reported no active battles in Bakhmut on Saturday and interpreted that as a sign that Russian fighters were regrouping “to strengthen its own capabilities.”
- Russian state-backed media and businesses are floating the idea of a six-day workweek to help fund Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, seemingly without extra pay, Britain’s Defense Ministry said in a Sunday update. It appears to be part of a plan to “actively make sacrifices in support of the war effort,” the ministry said. Margarita Simonyan, head of the state-funded RT channel, suggested that Russians should work in munitions factories for two hours each day after finishing their regular jobs, the ministry said.
- U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is traveling to Sweden, Norway and Finland from Monday to Friday to discuss support for Ukraine, among other matters, the State Department said. He will also attend a gathering of NATO foreign ministers in Oslo.
- Russia is expelling hundreds of German teachers and cultural workers, according to German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. The expulsion appears to be part of a retaliatory move announced in April, after the German government said it was “reducing the Russian intelligence presence” in its country.
In fields seeded with mines, Ukrainian farmers face deadly planting season: The Russian invasion has made Ukraine one of the most mined countries on the planet, officials there say, forcing farmers to balance the need to put food on tables against the risk of inadvertently setting off deadly ordnance, write Kamila Hrabchuk, Anastacia Galouchka and Alice Martins…..