[Discussion] Ukraine - Russian Invasion and Discussion

A place for aggregated discussions of a possible conflict, it’s implications and effects, news updates and personal accounts if any. If the expected conflict kicks off, I will change the title but the function will stay the same.

It's actually a really hard problem to solve. Deception is involved, as well as third-party (or more) transfers in other countries which are maybe not as good at protection as we are. It only takes one or two bad actors to move a *lot* of gear before being stopped, and of course intel services introduce people into target countries for just this purpose. I suspect Iran's intelligence service is probably not as bad as you might think.

It looks like the orcs are digging in in Melitopol and in a big way. I get that it is the only supply hub they have left and how important it is to them, but it is REALLY far away from the line of control. This tells me that they are less than completely confident in their ability to hold the crucial Zaporizhia line with what they have.

"orcs" is a level of dehumanisation I'm not comfortable with.

NathanialG wrote:

"orcs" is a level of dehumanisation I'm not comfortable with.

The things the invaders have done to the citizens of Ukraine are a level of dehumanization that I'm not comfortable with.

Nevin73 wrote:
NathanialG wrote:

"orcs" is a level of dehumanisation I'm not comfortable with.

The things the invaders have done to the citizens of Ukraine are a level of dehumanization that I'm not comfortable with.

I had forgotten that two wrongs make a right. Thanks for the reminder.

The YouTube algorithm served me up a Scott Ritter (!!!) interview from the last couple weeks (I honestly have NO idea why; what is the intersection of: Magic The Gathering, synthwave, weightlifting, Ukraine deep dives, evidence-based fitness, arcades, fighting games, swimming and heavy metal that would send me this apologist for genocide?). In it:

RUS is interested in trading land for RUS lives.
RUS could roflstomp UKR but is being nice.
RUS has the initiative on the battlefield.
RUS economy is doing well.
RUS doesn't want to conquer UKR.
UKR doesn't have ability to take Kherson.

The interview was dated a couple days before RUS retreated from Kherson.

Some people in some very different info bubbles out there!

Just FYI, the Ukrainians are the ones that are calling the invaders Orcs - it's not something that Paleo came up with. I am not about to tone-police a people who are fighting for their lives.

SallyNasty wrote:

Just FYI, the Ukrainians are the ones that are calling the invaders Orcs - it's not something that Paleo came up with. I am not about to tone-police a people who are fighting for their lives.

Just to add to this, they are also fighting to preserve the idea of being Ukrainian. Individuals are surely fighting for their lives and ones they care about. On top of that, if they lose, their identity as a people will be erased. This is why genocide is so awful, even beyond "mere" murder.

At least six die in Ukraine as dozens of missiles target civilian infrastructure

Russia has fired dozens of missiles at Ukraine in a new onslaught against the country’s civilian infrastructure, killing at least six people in residential areas, as Moscow once more tried to retaliate for its military defeats by targeting the population.

Ukraine’s armed forces estimated that Russia launched 70 cruise missiles, of which 51 were intercepted by air defences, in what the army called a “large-scale attack on crucial infrastructure facilities”.

Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said 21 out of 31 missiles targeting Kyiv were shot down before they reached their targets. One of the 10 that evaded the defences hit an apartment block in Vyshgorod, a northern suburb of Kyiv, killing three people and wounding 15.

There was a kindergarten in the lower ground floor of the building, but it was evacuated just in time after air raid sirens went off. The blast left a 3-metre crater in front of the building, destroyed the apartments around it, blew the tops of nearby trees and ruined a children’s playground.

“It flew right over us. We heard a whistling sound and then it came down on the building,” said Ruslan Vorona, a local resident. He and his eight-year-old son, Oleksii, were sheltering and charging their phones in an insulated tent set up by the emergency services.

Another local man, Oleksandr, 28, who would not give his last name, said: “There were a few explosions. Two were quieter and one was louder, and one of the missiles went straight over my head.”

So they can't win a war, but they can just pound all the infrastructure and immiserate the civilian populace into hopefully surrendering.

Ukraine faces 'humanitarian catastrophe' - WHO

Dr Hans Kluge, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) regional director for Europe, has warned that Ukraine faces a “humanitarian catastrophe” amid Russia’s strikes on its infrastructure.

“Hospitals cannot function without energy, maternity units need incubators, vaccine depots need refrigerators, surgery needs also electricity, and what we see is about 50% of the civilian energy infrastructure is being destroyed,” he told the BBC, adding that the situation could get worse with temperatures expected to plummet to minus 20 degrees Celsius.

Speaking from Dnipro, where he had been visiting psychiatric centres, he also highlighted the issue of mental health as a priority, and revealed he had heard stories of sexual violence or rape from those in recently liberated areas.

In a strange way, I think this latest round of terror bombing demonstrates that Putin finally gets that this war is fundamentally about logistics. It is, in essence, his attempt to turn the civilian population into a logistical liability in an attempt to even a very lopsided playing field. As winter approaches, he must recognize that his prospects for military action are rapidly diminishing and what window he has to affect the outcome is rapidly closing.

With the Kerch bridge effectively out for heavy logistical use, not just Putin's army but the entire civilian population west of Mariupol is dependent on a land bridge rail link with multiple single points of failure. Many of those points are within easy range of GMLRS. Some are even within range of 155mm howitzer fire.

The successful strategy used in the retaking of Kherson City was one involving two elements: 1) interdict logistics and 2) apply pressure to increase burn rate. They blew up the bridges and employed targeted attacks that forced the Russians to respond with fuel, food, medical supplies, ammunition, and reinforcements. And since the Ukrainians enjoyed the advantage of internal lines of supply, they were not subject to the same kind of interdiction. They also had a far lighter burn rate by virtue of better command and control and targeting. The only response the Russians could employ was to increase force composition, which, paradoxically, increased their burn rate.

In a lot of ways, the test case of Kherson provides a blueprint for what they will attempt in the south as a whole. Pinch off the supply along the critical rail link and pressure along the wide front between the Dneipro and Donetsk. Particularly as the temps drop and burn rates naturally increase, the prospect of an area wide collapse increases proportionately.

The Russians recognize this and, it appears, are responding by prioritizing attacks on hospitals, power, and water. They also appear to be doing so with great urgency as they recognize that the influx of more Ukrainian air defense will likely reduce the efficacy of these strikes in the future.

The problem with that is that, as Zelensky has shown, UKR can simply move the affected population elsewhere, at least for a while. It's an interesting problem. If Russia absolutely pounds UKR's civilian infrastructure and housing into dust, there's nothing left to conquer. But most of the world would treat them as complete pariahs even after the war is over. However, if they leave some intact, and populations stay, the UKR military remains motivated, supplied and capable, and they are not going to win anyway.

And then there's the talk of a push from Belarus toward Lviv and the Polish/NATO GLOCs and Kyiv, combined with 2 supporting pushes in Donetsk. Not sure if there's any chance at all that will work.

But I have a hunch that Russia will fail in this strategic campaign too.

Putin wants the land. Not the people, or buildings, or infrastructure. Just the fertile soil and new border.

How the rest of the world isn't responding more strongly to this targeting of civilian population (I know, Syria etc) boggles me. Just one more Crime Against Humanity on the pile?

polypusher wrote:

How the rest of the world isn't responding more strongly to this targeting of civilian population (I know, Syria etc) boggles me. Just one more Crime Against Humanity on the pile?

Putin has invested a whole lot in subverting democracy in the last 20 years. Bannon and his ilk have been forming American and western propaganda against the rules based international order for a while.

Paleocon wrote:

In a strange way, I think this latest round of terror bombing demonstrates that Putin finally gets that this war is fundamentally about logistics.

I'm skeptical of the idea that Putin 1) gives a f*ck about logistics or 2) is thinking about Ukraine in anything but a political way--both internal politics and politics among Ukraine's allies.

The evidence that Putin doesn't give a f*ck about logistics is all over this conflict. He kept the planning of the invasion a closely-held secret--even from military commanders who, in the time-honored way of Russian officers, had lied their f*cking asses off about the actual disposition and readiness of their troops. And he clearly hasn't learned much since then because we're currently on day 270whatever of what was supposed to be a three-day invasion.

A man who understands and cares about logistics wouldn't have waited until a month or so ago to start mobilizing additional troops, would have been ruthlessly purging the existing Russian officer corps for how tremendously bad it was executed and for why there's thousands of newly mobilized soldiers who aren't properly equipped, fed, housed, and, most importantly, being trained. A logistician certainly wouldn't be planning for another wave of mobilization over the winter as rumor has it the Russians already are because it's tremendously clear the system couldn't even handle the first wave of 300,000 and will absolutely choke on the next round.

A man who understands logistics would have clearly seen that Kherson west of the Dnipro was indefensible and would have allowed his generals to pull back those troops long ago. Putin didn't do that. He ordered Kherson defended at all costs for months and months and it was only when his generals made it exceptionally clear that they were about to lose the last bit of the most trained troops *and* Kherson in another humiliating defeat for Russia that he agreed to let them retreat.

But that retreat came at a cost to the generals. And that cost was they had to increase attacks around Bakhmut and throw as many bodies as it took to prevent additional losses of territory in Luhansk Oblast. Putin politically wants--needs--a military success to offset the loss of Kherson and he doesn't give a f*ck about how many ill-trained and supplied mobiks or convicts it takes. This is why the better part of a full BTG of Russians have been dying every day for weeks now: Putin needs to please the pro-war/ultra-nationalist part of Russia or, at a minimum, prevent them from blaming him for the failures of the special operation.

The infrastructure attacks on Ukraine, while they have some military value, is primarily designed to turn Ukrainians into a weapon that can be used against its NATO and European allies. They are the next Russia natural gas: something that can be used as a wedge. He's wrecking the power grid and conducting terror bombings because he wants millions of Ukrainians to flee to the safety of other countries where their welcome will be worn out and they'll be increasingly be viewed as a burden on those country's taxpayers rather than refugees fleeing a warmonger. He's doing that because, deep down, he knows that breaking the West's commitment to support Ukraine is the only way he's going to win.

At the end of the day victory for Putin means he stays in power. Everything else means nothing to him. I've even seen credible arguments presented that he wouldn't mind NATO getting involved and kicking the sh*t out of the Russian forces because he could 'honorably' take a loss against NATO and still stay in power because NATO (America) is the #1 military in the world.

Putin isn't fighting for land, he is fighting for the idea of empire.

OG_slinger wrote:
Paleocon wrote:

In a strange way, I think this latest round of terror bombing demonstrates that Putin finally gets that this war is fundamentally about logistics.

I'm skeptical of the idea that Putin 1) gives a f*ck about logistics or 2) is thinking about Ukraine in anything but a political way--both internal politics and politics among Ukraine's allies.

The evidence that Putin doesn't give a f*ck about logistics is all over this conflict. He kept the planning of the invasion a closely-held secret--even from military commanders who, in the time-honored way of Russian officers, had lied their f*cking asses off about the actual disposition and readiness of their troops. And he clearly hasn't learned much since then because we're currently on day 270whatever of what was supposed to be a three-day invasion.

A man who understands and cares about logistics wouldn't have waited until a month or so ago to start mobilizing additional troops, would have been ruthlessly purging the existing Russian officer corps for how tremendously bad it was executed and for why there's thousands of newly mobilized soldiers who aren't properly equipped, fed, housed, and, most importantly, being trained. A logistician certainly wouldn't be planning for another wave of mobilization over the winter as rumor has it the Russians already are because it's tremendously clear the system couldn't even handle the first wave of 300,000 and will absolutely choke on the next round.

A man who understands logistics would have clearly seen that Kherson west of the Dnipro was indefensible and would have allowed his generals to pull back those troops long ago. Putin didn't do that. He ordered Kherson defended at all costs for months and months and it was only when his generals made it exceptionally clear that they were about to lose the last bit of the most trained troops *and* Kherson in another humiliating defeat for Russia that he agreed to let them retreat.

But that retreat came at a cost to the generals. And that cost was they had to increase attacks around Bakhmut and throw as many bodies as it took to prevent additional losses of territory in Luhansk Oblast. Putin politically wants--needs--a military success to offset the loss of Kherson and he doesn't give a f*ck about how many ill-trained and supplied mobiks or convicts it takes. This is why the better part of a full BTG of Russians have been dying every day for weeks now: Putin needs to please the pro-war/ultra-nationalist part of Russia or, at a minimum, prevent them from blaming him for the failures of the special operation.

The infrastructure attacks on Ukraine, while they have some military value, is primarily designed to turn Ukrainians into a weapon that can be used against its NATO and European allies. They are the next Russia natural gas: something that can be used as a wedge. He's wrecking the power grid and conducting terror bombings because he wants millions of Ukrainians to flee to the safety of other countries where their welcome will be worn out and they'll be increasingly be viewed as a burden on those country's taxpayers rather than refugees fleeing a warmonger. He's doing that because, deep down, he knows that breaking the West's commitment to support Ukraine is the only way he's going to win.

At the end of the day victory for Putin means he stays in power. Everything else means nothing to him. I've even seen credible arguments presented that he wouldn't mind NATO getting involved and kicking the sh*t out of the Russian forces because he could 'honorably' take a loss against NATO and still stay in power because NATO (America) is the #1 military in the world.

I don't think any of what you have written above is necessarily antithetical with my assessment. It can both be true that Putin was a complete moron about logistics at the beginning of the war and that he understands now that the situation has changed since February. This would be consistent with his general pattern of decision making about, well, everything.

Putin has a history of being a sh*t planner who manages to rebrand disaster as genius by changing the victory conditions or adapting to opportunity. He's not a planner. He's an opportunist. And the situation has made it very clear to everyone that the conflict is an aggressively attritional one.

It is also possible that the operational decision making is not really Putin's but Surovikin's. Or that it could be Surovikin's strategy that Putin has agreed to for reasons other than a strategic understanding. In either case, it does seem to follow a certain logic that does comport with the laws of physics rather than the wishful thinking that it will somehow "break the Ukrainian will to fight" (nonsense that seems to be the narrative of the press).

RUS way of war: wave attacks of poorly led and equipped troops combined with terror campaigns against civilians, underwritten by an economy and culture averse to efficiency, fact-based analysis, individual initiative and beholden to subservience to The Boss.

That's a really poor strategy against a foe that comprehends the existential nature of the conflict and has the economic and military support to push back.

He's just delaying the inevitable, not unlike Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany, the Kaiser's Reich and Napoleon before him.

Top_Shelf wrote:

RUS way of war: wave attacks of poorly led and equipped troops combined with terror campaigns against civilians, underwritten by an economy and culture averse to efficiency, fact-based analysis, individual initiative and beholden to subservience to The Boss.

That's a really poor strategy against a foe that comprehends the existential nature of the conflict and has the economic and military support to push back.

He's just delaying the inevitable, not unlike Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany, the Kaiser's Reich and Napoleon before him.

To be clear, I do think the math on Surovikin's strategy doesn't really work out unless something drastically changes between now and the intersection point between their burn rate and their logistics deficit. They are clearly not going to bomb their way to victory. The buying of more time seems to be the point.

Again, going back to Putin's modus, he seems to be banking on something coming up like he always does. He has, historically, been a sort of mass murdering Charlie Harper of world leaders (something always comes up). Hopefully, this is where someone drops a piano on him.

The following is an account of a contract soldier of Russia's 155th Naval Infantry Brigade who was deployed to Plavlivka in Donetsk Oblast.

It was originally posted by the Grey Zone, a Telegram channel linked to Wagner Group. While there's been some independent confirmation of the scale of Russian losses happening it should be kept in mind that the publicizing of stuff like this is also part of Yevgeny Prigozhin's ongoing political machinations and power struggle against the Russian MoD.

This is also a continuation of the brigade writing an open letter to the Primorsky region (where the brigade is based) governor Oleg Kozhemyako complaining about how incompetent commanders and unclear orders resulted in the brigade taking massive casualties and losing half their equipment at the beginning of November. The governor said he had spoken to the brigade's commanders and that the men were lying, that the casualty rate was low (thanks to the fine leadership of the officers), and the brigade had moved the line forward five kilometers.

Behind the scenes, though, the men who wrote the letter were punished by forcing them to lead subsequent assaults and remain behind to defend against Ukrainian counter-attacks.

The pre-invasion population of Plavlivka was around 2,500 people. It's become one of the focal points of Russian attacks since the fall of Kherson and had repeatedly traded hands throughout November.

Mediazona wrote:

The brigade had about 4,000 men. Now, not all of us are at the front lines. Some are in the rear, some are manning the artillery, etc. Our battalion tactical group is 500 men, give or take, constantly being re-staffed. But there is not one single BTG in all of Ukraine. Our assault troops are also active in other areas.

I spent three months in this area. The fighting continued every day, and there were two intense days, 9 and 10 November. Overall, about 450–500 men were killed in Pavlivka.

The reaction to our appeal [to the governor] was not what we expected. We hoped that the command would change tactics. I wasn’t among those who wrote the letter, I’m from another company.

The objectors were threatened with criminal cases. I personally filed a refusal report, but it vanished miraculously. As Pavlivka was declared under full control, we continued to lose men. Our command acts like it’s a circus. They decided that [the troops] should get awards. In short, they get to keep their ranks and we get medals to keep silence. Except we don’t f*cking need them, no one can bring our dead boys back.

Everyone is demoralised. Nobody is celebrating, because so many of our guys are dead. Personally, I lost four friends in just two days. It just pisses me off that our command does not think about the men. They want medals and stripes, so these sons of Female Doggoes are ready to send people to their certain death. They think that if they give us a medal, we ought to forget everything and shut up, but they’re wrong because their friends didn’t die while they were sitting in the rear all cosy. They are concerned with other stuff: like how can they get a Hero of Russia title or new stars on their shoulders.

Now that the command decided to withdraw from Pavlivka, we were all very happy, but not for long. Not everyone will be withdrawn. Not everyone will be withdrawn. The people who were among the most disgruntled, who wrote a letter and refused to storm the village, will continue to man their positions, and those who didn’t stand their ground against the command will be taken to the rear.

I stay because I didn’t keep silence.

In short, the ramifications of penning the letter are still there. They don’t change tactics, they can only punish. I think they want to eliminate all the mavericks, which is not a hard thing to do on the battlefield, it’s very easy. Once again I am convinced that my life is worth nothing here. We are controlled by those who care not about the people but about their rank and reputation. It’s very frightening.

They will never outright say [that this is meant as a punishment], but think about it: after the letter was published, we were ordered to assault Pavlivka, and then, miraculously, it is those disgruntled men who remain in their positions, while others are being taken to the rear. We all understand perfectly well why this is happening. They leave 100–150 troops, and the same number of men are being withdrawn, maybe more. We’ve been given a new task, to fortify positions in Pavlivka and prepare for a new assault. We are living in trenches and in those houses that more or less have survived the shelling.

The brigade was almost completely destroyed, it has already been re-staffed, but you have to understand that it really depends on those old servicemen who train the young ones, that’s why the brigade is not totally useless in combat yet. Now that we are gradually being eliminated and replaced with the newly mobilised men, this unit becomes irrelevant.

Now we have a lot of recruits in our brigade, because of the heavy losses in Pavlivka. We have small arms, mostly. Almost no heavy weapons. Tanks and other armoured vehicles were destroyed, and with what’s left you can either shoot or drive. Food is very scarce. We walk around, collecting what’s left in the basements. They bring us dry rations, mostly, and not regularly.

Near Pavlivka, we lost about 450 men. Overall, the toll is up to 900 men wounded and killed, more than half killed.

People are thinking of deserting, and I understand it, I am now contemplating the same idea. I have always served the motherland faithfully and used to condemn this kind of thinking, but now it is probably the only way we can stay alive. I cannot understand why they treat people like that when there is not enough manpower and mobilisation is in progress.

Paleocon wrote:

To be clear, I do think the math on Surovikin's strategy doesn't really work out unless something drastically changes between now and the intersection point between their burn rate and their logistics deficit.

Speaking of which...

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/vrjwtTS.png)

Paleocon wrote:
Top_Shelf wrote:

RUS way of war: wave attacks of poorly led and equipped troops combined with terror campaigns against civilians, underwritten by an economy and culture averse to efficiency, fact-based analysis, individual initiative and beholden to subservience to The Boss.

That's a really poor strategy against a foe that comprehends the existential nature of the conflict and has the economic and military support to push back.

He's just delaying the inevitable, not unlike Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany, the Kaiser's Reich and Napoleon before him.

To be clear, I do think the math on Surovikin's strategy doesn't really work out unless something drastically changes between now and the intersection point between their burn rate and their logistics deficit. They are clearly not going to bomb their way to victory. The buying of more time seems to be the point.

Again, going back to Putin's modus, he seems to be banking on something coming up like he always does. He has, historically, been a sort of mass murdering Charlie Harper of world leaders (something always comes up). Hopefully, this is where someone drops a piano on him.

I don't know that "buying more time" is an actual strategy they are pursuing?

Here is what I mean: JPN military leaders (at least the Navy, if not the ridiculously delusional Army) knew they could not win and yet they still kept going. This wasn't so much out of a sense of duty (as we might describe it in the West) but more of a, "it is what it is" type thinking which could not conceive of changing course.

This appears to be part of what may be in play in RUS.

A mindset of, "Decision has been made, decisions are not changed or questioned, so we just keep plodding forward."

Top_Shelf wrote:

I don't know that "buying more time" is an actual strategy they are pursuing?

Basically it is.

Russia currently doesn't have enough troops in Ukraine to go on the offensive anymore. They barely have enough troops to hold off Ukrainian pushes.

So Russia needs time to mobilize, equip, and train enough new troops so that it has enough operational reserves that it can, at some future date, go back on the offensive. Whether or not Russia will have the tanks, BMPs, artillery, ammunition, etc. to feed that future offensive is also an open question.

That Russia's been dumping freshly mobilized and entirely untrained troops on the front line demonstrates how much they're trying to buy more time. They are literally trying to bog down Ukrainian advances with mobik or Wagner corpses.

Russia is also trying to buy more time in hopes that Ukraine's Western allies will develop political fatigue and lessen or end their support. Russia is also actively working to make that happen, as witnessed by its attempts to create another humanitarian crisis and generate millions of Ukrainian refugees with its infrastructure attacks or its standard misinformation campaigns (One of the latest ones was that the FSB smashed a Ukrainian saboteur team, killing two, that was going to blow up a Russian power plant near Voronezh. Turns out it was a repeat of the FSB's The Sim's debacle back in April and the 'Ukrainian saboteurs' were actually an airsoft group who LARPed the STALKER video games.)

Yeah. It is seems to me that they are stalling in hopes of some kind of black swan event like a successful right wing coup in America or something.

Massive cold snap in Europe. Stooges gain power in the UK, France or Germany. Global recession. Who knows. I suspect Putin doesn't either though.

Those statements could make sense IF this was a group of planners that put things into place to effectuate an outcome.

What I'm arguing is that is decidedly not what is happening.

There is no plan.

There is a hope, that by doing things (partial mobilization, scary talk, haphazard drone attacks that are not nearly as effective as they would be if if they were coordinated and overwhelmed the AA), some better result than today would occur.

That's very similar to what other belligerents did in WW2. Never truly acknowledging they were holding losing cards and should have, at the least, grabbed what they could. Instead they kept beholden to maximalist, impossible, goals.

I think we're treating RUS (and Putin) as planners when who they really are is a bunch of folks who have no clue how to stop a train that's left the station.

I dunno. Maybe I'm spitting hairs here.

Axon wrote:

Massive cold snap in Europe. Stooges gain power in the UK, France or Germany. Global recession. Who knows. I suspect Putin doesn't either though.

Maybe the horse will learn to talk.

Top_Shelf wrote:

I dunno. Maybe I'm spitting hairs here. :)

It's a duscission board, we are allowed to split hairs Part of the fun.

But I get your point. Long and short of it is we'll never know. If Putin fails, he fails and we'll spend our days wondering what he was actually thinking. If succeeds he'll claim some 4D chess strategy and we can never prove otherwise. Kind of par for the course these days.

I think the mistake is to look for a plan. Putin hasn’t really shown a pattern of planning. Part of that is because his national initiative is all too often dictated by the price of oil. If oil is down, he is poor. If oil is up, he has the cash to go commit crimes against humanity. As such, his pattern has been to be an opportunist. He readies himself for circumstances and takes advantage when they arise. When thing’s don’t go right, he stalls for another opportunity.

Putin is the Ricky Bobby of world leaders.

Iranian drone advisers who were helping Russia bombard Ukraine were killed in Crimea, Kyiv official says

Ukraine killed Iranians who were advising Russians on how to pilot Iranian-made drones in Crimea, Ukraine's top security official confirmed, per a report.

"You shouldn't be where you shouldn't be," Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine's national security and defense council, said in an interview in Kyiv, according to The Guardian.

"They were on our territory. We didn't invite them here, and if they collaborate with terrorists and participate in the destruction of our nation we must kill them."