Russia-Ukraine War 2022

[eloise]

Well, your information comes from unverified Russian sources in SoMe. Moreover, not one but two Black Hawks participated in the action. It's very difficult to know what is true and what is false information.

If the claim of killing these troops had come solely from Russian propaganda channel, there might have been reason to doubt its veracity. Unfortunately, there is actual video evidence, showing both the Black Hawks flying overhead and the troops being killed. In both case these were recorded by FPV drone. Even very hardcore Ukraine supporter like Ukraine battle map has to admit this operation look like a failure

Admittedly, at this point only the troops from one Black Hawk have been confirmed KIA. Even so, that represents a 50% loss before they were able to take any action. And honestly, I don’t really see how 5-10 troops can help a surrounded city?. What would be the objective in this case?.

[eloise]

Absolutely!
This is typical from Russian bots
Just like when the Dobropillia offensive happened, eloise came here all aroused claiming that this would be the end for Ukraine and all but then when this same offensive failed and the Russian troops got surrounded, the same eloise "disappeared" for weeks and didn't type a word anymore about it:

You automatically assume anyone who says something even slightly negative about the current situation is a Russian bot. I have posted about Ukraine’s victories plenty of times, even in this very thread. Unlike you though, I don’t cherry pick only the good news. When Ukrainian are in a bad situation, I call it as it is.

Oh and the same GUR Blackhawk helicopters continue to transport troops to the Pokrovsk front:
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/ ... EyucA&s=08
So...

And how would you know that video were not taken before these helicopter landed and troops are killed?

[fbw]

You automatically assume anyone who says something even slightly negative about the current situation is a Russian bot.

I not assuming that you are a Russian bot. I know you are a Sino-Russian bot!

I've been dealing with your kind countless times and guess what? You aren't even among the best of them.

I’ve been on several forums with Eloise, who is an intelligent, informed poster. You should learn from her. This is an embarrassing post, even for you.

[viperzerof-2]

You automatically assume anyone who says something even slightly negative about the current situation is a Russian bot.

I not assuming that you are a Russian bot. I know you are a Sino-Russian bot!

I've been dealing with your kind countless times and guess what? You aren't even among the best of them.

Not a bot I’ve interacted with Eloise, definitely a real person. I don’t always agree but I feel that is too strong an accusation and pushes decorum.

[Corsair1963]

Putin is making a very big mistake dragging on the War in Ukraine. (IMHO)

He obviously believes they can win a long, protracted war of attrition. Yet, that is looking less and less likely by the day.

If he settles now, he likely could keep most of the territory currently in his possession. He waits, and he could lose it all and go broke! (or worse)

[ricnunes]

You automatically assume anyone who says something even slightly negative about the current situation is a Russian bot.

I not assuming that you are a Russian bot. I know you are a Sino-Russian bot!

I've been dealing with your kind countless times and guess what? You aren't even among the best of them.

Not a bot I’ve interacted with Eloise, definitely a real person. I don’t always agree but I feel that is too strong an accusation and pushes decorum.

Of course it's a real person. I never meant to say or hint that "eloise" was an AI or Chatbot or whatever!
With "Sino-Russian bot", I mean someone who's really pushing the Russian (and Chinese) propaganda and narrative to the forum like for example that "The Ukrainians disembarking from those Blackhawks we all killed". This seems clearly to be false and it's easy to reach such conclusion since:
1- If that really happened then the Ukrainians would never shared that video with their soldiers disembarking from those Blackhawk helicopters.
2- This would have been confirmed by other sources by now but it wasn't!

It's not the first time that "eloise" does this, far, far from it! I have nothing more to say about the subject.

[eloise]

Changes on the frontline in Ukraine for October 2025 (recorded by AMK mapping):

Yellow = Russian advances
Light blue = Ukrainian advances

Russian advances:
Donetsk Oblast: ~376.38 km²
Dnipropetrovsk Oblast: ~143.92 km²
Zaporizhzhia Oblast: ~103.66 km²
Kharkiv Oblast: ~62.06 km²
Sumy Oblast: ~13.98 km²
Kherson Oblast: ~12.70 km²
Belgorod Oblast: ~3.98 km²

Total: ~716.68 km² (up by 42.05%)
Total (excluding Kursk & Belgorod): ~712.70 km²

Ukrainian advances:
Donetsk Oblast: ~58.46 km²
Kharkiv Oblast: ~11.00 km²
Sumy Oblast: ~2.92 km²
Zaporizhzhia Oblast: ~0.49 km²

Total: ~72.87 km² (up by 0.89%).

Note: This covers net gains for each side. Ukrainian advances that took place on territory Russia occupied within this month will simply be subtracted from the Russian total, and vice versa.

[disconnectedradical]

Putin is making a very big mistake dragging on the War in Ukraine. (IMHO)

He obviously believes they can win a long, protracted war of attrition. Yet, that is looking less and less likely by the day.

If he settles now, he likely could keep most of the territory currently in his possession. He waits, and he could lose it all and go broke! (or worse)

Frankly, attrition doesn’t favor Ukraine simply because of disparity in resources and manpower. The Russians are taking higher losses, based on probate records that are the most objective and accurate for both sides (UAlosses and Mediazona), about 30-40% higher, but not enough to offset their greater population which is 300% of Ukraine’s.

A lot of this can be blamed on the west too, aid has been drip fed to prevent Ukraine from collapsing, but not enough to let the decisively win, and as democratic societies there often isn’t the political will to invest heavily in rearmament to the scale that the Russians are doing, since the threat doesn’t seem as immediate.

Ukraine can only win the attrition fight if they receive more aid, and at the strategic level they can find a better way to rotate and replenish their infantry ranks, because often times their lines are too thinly manned.

[darkmount]

Ukraine isn't winning the attrition war, far from it actually.

Russia outproduces NATO in 155mm artillery shells, rocket artillery, glide bombs and AD missiles.

They have also a lot more manpower than Ukraine, and tbh I find it very weird that there are tons of videos of Ukrainian men getting dragged into vans but none of this is shared here in this forum.


I have many friends from Ukraine, and every time I speak with them I'm surprised at how much negative they are about the outcome of the war compered to some overly positive people in the West.


And to be fair, yes Russia is getting clapped very hard, they lost ton sh*t of their tanks, IFVs, APCs, Howitzer, towed artillery, AD systems and etc. Russia has become so irrelevant that it can't even help it's allies anymore, even their most loyal partners like Serbia went for Rafale and other major partners once Russia had like Iraq and Iran are turning to China.


But overall, none of this seems to break the Russian economy, nor it's military.


What people need to understand is that Ukraine hasn't run out of opportunities, but the issue with Ukraine is that it's fate is very much dependent on the mode of western leaders, if they put enough support, Ukraine might still be able to take some territory back, but if western leaders do nothing and instead keep blaming Trump or someone else for not single handedly liberating all of Ukraine then nothing will change in Ukraine's favour.


And tbh, this is exactly what European leaders are doing, they are covering up their failures by pointing fingers at Trump.

What has Europe done since what they call a Russian asset took office?

Cruise missile production is practically none existent.

155mm shells still can't even fulfil 1/3 of Ukraine's needs

AD missile production is very limited, and only Italy and France have long-range SAMs that can somewhat replace or supplement Patriot.


Other countries either don't produce any AD or product limited quantities of shorter range systems.


Fighter jets? We are 4 years into this war and only now Sweden thought about giving up some of it's old Gripen.

What about the others? I'm sure there are lots of older Tranche Typhoons that could've been given to Ukraine but no.


If the EU began working on solving half of these issues Ukraine would've been in a much better position, but they were busy calculating escalations and making sure Putin isn't too pissed off.

[disconnectedradical]

Well I’ll be blunt. Constantly portraying an overly positive outlook for Ukraine that doesn’t reflect reality on the ground, does NOT help Ukraine.

Ukraine has scored plenty of victories but also suffered plenty of losses. If all of Ukraine’s missteps are swept under the rug and not brought to attention, then it’s less scrutiny to hold accountable those who were responsible, and demand changes and corrections to prevent mistakes from happening again. Ignoring mistakes and losses (or worse, reflexively denying them) makes it less likely to learn from those losses, and is hubris.

I rather see the reality of the war reported realistically the way it is, even the negative parts, rather than simply being a cheerleader and think everything is fine. You keep doing the latter, reflexively disregarding setbacks or anything that seems uncomfortable, and that does NOT help Ukraine win. They need a viable and realistic strategy based on their situation, not cheerleading.

[ricnunes]

After some consideration, I decided that I'll continue to expose Russia propaganda and misinformation here even if it costs me further warnings or even a ban here from this forum!

This being said and just one more evidence that the Russian sources are not in any way reliable and are nothing more than propaganda tools in every way possible. Here's an example:

There's a clip/video which is going around with subtitles in different languages of a guy that claims to be Ukrainian and just turned 23 and doesn’t want to die at the front. There's also a higher-quality version on TikTok.
However:
- Ukraine doesn’t draft 22–23-year-olds. At that age you only end up in the Ukrainian Defence Forces if you sign up yourself.
- Running a basic face-recognition check brings up exactly one match. He uses the handle Kussia88 across platforms, and his real name is Vladimir Yuryevich Ivanov (Иванов Владимир Юрьевич), born April 7, 2003, from St. Petersburg.

Source: https://twitter.com/splendid_pete/status/1985 ... SVo9w&s=08


Next, evidence that Russia is not winning the war as some are trying to say here:

In search for men, Putin has signed a law mandating year-round military conscription in Russia. Starting next year, citizens not in reserve can be called up any time from January 1 to December 31. However, deployments to service units will still occur twice annually.

Source: https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/198574 ... IwpXw&s=08


And my favourite which goes in line with what was last reported in this thread:

POKROVSK IS HOLDING: a joint operation by the Ukrainian Defense Ministry and the Armed Forces of Ukraine is underway in the city. Ukrainian units stabilize the situation, drive the enemy out of the industrial zone and cut off their supply routes.
Helicopters deliver reinforcements, and units on the ground advance and consolidate control over key areas.
This is a real counteroffensive at the local level, where intelligence and the army act as one. The Russians are forced to retreat, and Ukrainian forces regain control over key areas

Source: https://twitter.com/Heroiam_Slava/status/1985 ... fD2AA&s=08



For what's worth, yes there's also propaganda from the Ukrainian side. However it's usually not false as opposed to the Russian propaganda and moreover, I know on which side I'm on and I've said this several times in the past: I'm 100% on the Ukrainian side and if "spreading" Ukrainian propaganda helps Ukraine in any way then I'll be happy to spread it as wars are also fought in the information domain and nowadays in the age of the Internet and Social Media, even more than ever!

[ricnunes]

Well I’ll be blunt. Constantly portraying an overly positive outlook for Ukraine that doesn’t reflect reality on the ground, does NOT help Ukraine.

And I'll be blunt with you: being a "contrarian" does NOT help Ukraine in any way!

Like I said in my last post, wars and namely this one, doesn't only occur in the battlefield but also in the information domain including all and every possible sources in the Internet such as all types of Social Media or even forums like this one! Ignoring this is being short-sighted to say the least and being complacent with the Russian propaganda which is almost always false - such as accepting or allowing it - is helping the Russian side!

I'm not the one who's reporting something that isn't the reality on the ground and I've been proving this time after time. For what's worth, I never said that the Ukraine situation was good, however the Russian situation is far worse. Saying that losing hundreds of thousands of soldiers while taking several months to only take very small patches of land which often are less than 15 km in depth is "Russia winning" is either being a Russian propagandist or else being a contrarian and someone who doesn't have a clue about the strategical situation and how the Ukrainian strategical plan is all about. I think/believe your case is the second/later case.

[hornetfinn]

I don't know what happened after that helicopter landing by Ukraine in Pokrovsk but the Russian video of their destruction does seem rather iffy to me. The first part about landing came from Ukraine and I wonder why the hell would they do that if they were decimated? It was also just 10 men, which in this scale is nothing either as a combat force for Ukraine or as a loss of combat power for them. There are videos and claims about getting more troops via helos but nothing from Russian side.

Is the situation in Pokrovsk bad and difficult for Ukraine? For sure it is and I doubt anybody would claim otherwise. Losing it would not be a good thing at all, but it'd not be a total disaster either. It would help Russia somewhat especially short-term but giving it up would also shorten the frontline for Ukraine which could help them defend against further Russian advances especially if they have managed to build defensive lines there. Currently it seems to me that the fighting there can still go on for some time before either Ukrainians have to withdraw or Russian forces are exhausted.

[milosh]

Some Ukrainian sources which aren't known as russian proxies do think video is legit. Also it look like there is big pressure not to talk about video on Ukrainian net, after all it is gru operation.

But that video doesn't mean operation was nonsense. In fact YouTuber which can be considered pro russian (history legends) do have good analysis. In short at least three helios were used and from we saw drones probably hit four commandos. He gave couple of reasons which can be goal of operation and they sound logical.

I would also add propaganda element but because of this russian video effect is much smaller.

Problem with Pokrovsk is timing. I mean if Russians take it, you can expect trump will be "I was right Ukraine can't win and then bla bla bla". Also Pokrovsk is problem if Putin goal is Donbas. Zelenaski would have quite weaker negotiation position. Without Pokrovsk they say defense of rest of Donbas is very problematic.

[not_kent]

This is not what winning looks like. Even if Russia if the war ended now and Russia gets to keep all he territory it currently has it would have been far too costly.

Russian arms exports have declined significantly in recent years, dropping from approximately \(\$14.6\) billion in 2021 to less than \(\$1\) billion by the end of 2024. This represents a total decrease of over 90% from 2021 levels, with exports falling to \(\$8\) billion in 2022 and \(\$3\) billion in 2023. The number of countries purchasing major Russian arms also decreased from 31 in 2019 to 12 in 2023. 

Russia’s natural gas exports have dwindled by an estimated 42 percent since 2021, the year before the country invaded Ukraine.

All NATO allies are expected to meet the goal of spending 2% of their GDP on defense for 2025.
2035 target: Allies have now agreed to increase this to a new goal of 5% of GDP by 2035, with annual plans to show a credible path to reach it.
2 New NATO countries since the invasion.

And there will be no where else to expand to.
Poland plans to spend approximately $45 billion, or 4.7% of its GDP, on defense. A proposal for 2026 suggests increasing this further to 4.8% of GDP.
Key priorities: A substantial portion of the budget is allocated to acquiring new military equipment, with a focus on modernization.
Procurement: Poland is purchasing significant military hardware from the U.S. and South Korea, including F-35 fighter jets, Apache helicopters, and K2 tanks.
Domestic industry: The country is also investing in its own defense industry to build up its domestic capabilities, including components for its military.
Border security: A specific amount of funding has been set aside for enhancing border security with Belarus.