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“The Russo-Ukraine War: Counterattack in Bakhmut and Wagner Group’s Fate”

[Voice of Hope, May 10, 2023](Comprehensive report by our reporter Tang Yu) The Russo-Ukraine war has lasted for more than 14 months. Ukraine launched a counterattack in Udonbakhmut on the day Russia celebrated the “Victory Day” of World War II. Thousands of soldiers from an independent Russian brigade abandoned the battle and fled. The Russian mercenary organization Wagner Group claimed that it lost 500 people, while the Wagner leader declared that he was threatened by the authorities “withdrawing would amount to betrayal”. Britain is rumored to designate Wagner as a terrorist organization. An Agence France-Presse reporter was killed under gunfire in Udon, and many parties mourned and thanked him for taking the risk to tell the truth. Canada and Latvia announced a joint training of Ukrainian soldiers against aggression. Analysis pointed out that Russia’s much-vaunted “de-dollarization” is turning into “renminbiization”, and Russia’s economic development will stagnate. The United States has destroyed Russia’s “sophisticated” spyware that has been monitoring 50 countries for 20 years, severely setting back Russia’s cyber attack capabilities.

The Ukrainian Army counterattacked the Russian Independent Brigade in Bakhmut, abandoned the formation and fled, Wagner claimed to have lost 500 people

According to comprehensive foreign media reports, the Ukrainian military stated on May 10 that the Ukrainian troops stationed in the important town of Bakhmut (Bakhmut) in Uzbekistan launched a counterattack and successfully defeated the 72nd Independent Motorized Rifle Brigade of the Russian Army, forcing the Russian army to abandon its position and flee. , suffered “serious losses”. A brigade of the Russian army usually has thousands of soldiers.

CNN reported that Andriy Biletsky, the commander of Ukraine’s third independent assault brigade, posted a video on social media on the 10th, describing the battle in detail.

“In fact, the brigade’s sixth and seventh companies were basically destroyed, the brigade’s intelligence department was destroyed, a large number of combat vehicles were destroyed, and a considerable number of prisoners of war were captured,” Biletsky said. .

“The counterattack was carried out in an area 3 kilometers wide and 2.6 kilometers long, and now this entire territory has been liberated from Russian occupation forces,” Biletsky added.

Reuters asked the Russian Ministry of Defense about the situation, but has not yet received any comment.

The Ukrainian military report stated that it confirmed from another aspect that Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Russian mercenary organization Wagner Group (Wagner Group), said the day before (9th) that the Russian army was misdirected and that a Russian army fled the battle. position, exposing Wagner’s flank to the Ukrainian army.

“Our troops are fleeing. The 72nd Brigade retreated 3 kilometers this morning, and I lost 500 people here,” Prigezin released a video on the 9th bombarding the “stupidity” of the Russian commander, questioning ” Why can’t Russia protect its own country?”

Prigozin also retorted that Ukraine’s planned offensive is “on the ground and not on TV.” “So far in our country, everyone thinks that everything must be done on TV.”

The Russian media broadcasts the Russian military’s attacks almost around the clock, and also glorifies the Russian military’s performance from an absolutely positive perspective.

On the 9th, Russian President Vladimir Putin was holding a “Victory Day” military parade on Moscow’s Red Square, “showing off his muscles” at home and abroad through television, and the top Russian military leaders were participating in the military parade. Ukraine chose to counterattack Bakhmut on the same day. Troops were routed at the front and suffered heavy casualties, which is quite ironic compared to the “Victory Day” parade.

In addition, it is rumored that there were actually only about 8,000 soldiers in the military parade that day, far less than the previous tens of thousands of soldiers, mainly because the elite Russian troops have been beaten and disabled. However, the weapon display session lasted just over 6 minutes. The leader of the battle was the old T-34 tank from World War II, and there was only one tank. participate. The “Victory Day” military parade has shrunk significantly, and some observers believe that Putin’s defeat has already been revealed.

Reuters reported that Ukraine’s general staff usually does not provide details of the fighting in its routine battle reports. In its battle report, the Ukrainian General Staff did not mention the latest outbreak of fighting in Bakhmut, saying only that Russia “launched an unsuccessful offensive in Bakhmut”.

The Russian army has launched a large-scale attack on Bahemut since last summer. The Wagner Group is the main force of the Russian attack on the local area, making Bahemut the most tragic and bloody ground strangulation and attrition war in Europe since World War II. Under the tenacious resistance of the Ukrainian defenders, although the Russian army captured most of the city’s territory, it was still unable to fully occupy it.

In addition, a video of the Ukrainian Third Independent Assault Brigade’s counterattack against the Russian army southwest of Bakhmut was released on Twitter. The Twitter account “@Danspiun” posted a video on PO. At the beginning, Ukrainian tanks charged into battle in the woods, and then Ukrainian soldiers advanced while exchanging fire with the enemy. Russian soldiers could be seen killed along the way, and then a Ukrainian armored vehicle swept away. The Russian army is hidden in the woods. The next scene is that the Russian armored vehicle unit was destroyed by the Ukrainian shelling, and the Ukrainian armed forces swept away the remaining Russian troops.

The tweet stated that the Ukrainian 3rd Assault Brigade launched a 2-day counter-offensive in Bila Hora, southwest of the Bakhmut Front. As a result of the battle, 64 Russian troops were killed, 87 Russian soldiers were missing, and 5 were captured. The Russian army and the Ukrainian army destroyed the Russian BMP armored vehicles and mortar positions.

The Twitter account “@AlexChe31659937” tweeted on the 10th that the well-known Russian Telegram channel General SVR stated on May 7 that the losses of the Russian army in Ukraine were actually much more than reported by the Ukrainian General Staff. Nearly 270,000 people have died or gone missing in the Russian Federation during the past 14 months of war. Among them, 195,754 soldiers died or disappeared due to the war in the regular army alone. The initial loss of Wagner PMC was 65,091. In addition, the loss of the Russian National Guard has reached 7,724.

The head of Wagner said he was threatened with “retreat or betrayal” and it was rumored that the UK planned to list Wagner as a terrorist organization

Reuters reported that the Wagner Group leader Priggin released the video on the 9th, saying, “I received an operational order yesterday, which clearly stated that if we leave the Bakhmut position, it will be regarded as a betrayal of the motherland.”

Prigojin said for a second time on Friday that if his troops were unable to obtain the ammunition they needed to fight, they would immediately withdraw from Bakhmut.

In this regard, Prigojin complained bitterly: “If there is a lack of ammunition, we will still withdraw from the position and be forced to become traitors; but obviously the people who really betray the motherland are those who control the supply of ammunition.”

At the end of the film, Priggine reluctantly stated that he would ask his troops to stay in Bachemt. He repeatedly accused the Russian Ministry of Defense of deliberately letting the Wagner Group exhaust its ammunition, saying that it was “working hard to ensure that all combat units have the resources they need”.

The infighting within the Russian army continued. On the 8th, Prigozin said that the ammunition problem seemed to be being resolved, but on the 9th he changed his words, pointing out that the supply has been cut again, “They only deliver 10% of our demand. . We were cheated”.

However, the Ukrainian military stated that there was no sign of Wagner’s lack of ammunition on the Bakhmut front line. On the contrary, they also increased the intensity of shelling.

On the other hand, Reuters reported that the “Times” broke the news that the Wagner Group continued to storm Bahemut and committed war crimes many times. It was reported that the British government will officially recognize the Wagner Group as a terrorist organization and impose economic sanctions and Other penalties, in order to put more pressure on Russia, the report quoted a government source as saying that the Ministry of the Interior has opened the case for 2 months and plans to pass it within a few weeks.

If designated as a terrorist organization, it will be a criminal offense to attend meetings about Wagner, encourage support for it, or carry its symbol in public; financial sanctions will also be imposed on groups designated as terrorist organizations, and Wagner’s ability to raise funds will be affected .

Agence France-Presse reporter Wu Dong was attacked and killed

Comprehensive foreign media reports, Agence France-Presse video reporter Arman Soldin (Arman Soldin) and his team went deep into the town of Chasiv Yar (Chasiv Yar) near Bahemut to report. Unexpectedly, at around 4:30 p.m. In the Grad rocket attack, a rocket landed near the place where the 32-year-old Soldin was lying on his stomach, killing Soldin on the spot. The other four members of the AFP team were not injured.

Soldin was born in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, and is a French citizen. He was one of the first members of the AFP team sent to Ukraine, where Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022. day arrived there.

Soldin has lived in Ukraine since September last year and is the main force of the AFP team’s video reports, and will routinely go to the front lines in Udon and Unan.

“The loss of Sordin has been deeply saddening across the agency,” said AFP chairman Fabrice Fries. He said Soldin’s death reflected “the risks and threats that journalists face day in and day out in reporting on the conflict in Ukraine.” .

The Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, French President Emmanuel Macron, and the White House of the United States all tweeted their condolences to Soldin and his family members, as well as their working partners, and expressed their gratitude to Soldin for bravely standing on the front line of the battlefield and bringing the truth to the world.

Soldin was particularly good at capturing how civilians caught up in the war were trying to survive amidst the chaos, say former associates who worked with him. Find a heartwarming moment in Kyiv, for example, when a father conscripted into the army and his young son flee overseas use an online strategy game to bond. And earlier this month, he even rescued an injured hedgehog from a trench, nursed it back to health and named it Lucky.

According to Reporters Without Borders, at least 11 members of the media team covering the Russia-Ukraine war, including Sordin, have been killed.

Canadian Defense Minister Anita Anand (Anita Anand) held a joint press conference with Latvian Defense Minister Inara Murniece in Ottawa on the 10th and announced that the two militaries will jointly train Ukrainian soldiers in Latvia to assist Ukraine in its fight against Russian aggression. Get started on May 15th.

The two militaries will train junior Ukrainian officers in battlefield responsibility, planning, command, movement coordination, intelligence and reconnaissance, and other operational essentials.

Anand said the training would complement Operation Unifier, which is currently training Ukrainian troops in Britain and Poland with Canada and other Western countries.

Analysis: “De-dollarization” and “RMBization” will stagnate Russia’s economic development

Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center published an article on the 9th by non-resident scholar Alexandra Prokopenko, pointing out that Russia used to focus on technological development and diversification of energy sector exports, but now these have been capital controls, friendly And the labels of hostile countries, and the yuanization of payments, and the militarization of the state budget are replaced.

Prokopenko pointed out that Russia is increasingly dependent on China, and discounted energy export prices have weakened Russia’s profitability. Russia is also increasingly dependent on China for imports of high-tech and consumer goods. These payments are mainly in RMB Instead of the Russian ruble, “the much-vaunted de-dollarization of the Russian economy is turning into yuanization.”

Sheko argues that the continued focus on commodity prices and the dramatic increase in the militarization of state spending (about one-third of the total budget) means that Russia’s economic development will stagnate for a long time to come. And even if the period of hostilities ends, military spending is unlikely to decrease as long as any form of Putinism exists.

U.S. dismantles Russian security agency’s ‘sophisticated’ spyware, hampering its cyber attack capabilities

The U.S. Justice Department said on the 9th that it had shut down Russia’s FSB’s “sophisticated” malware network that has spied on 50 countries for 20 years, with victims including NATO allies and U.S. government agencies. and technology companies.

The Russian FSB has previously successfully planted malware called Snake or Uroburos on computer systems around the world, targeting government networks, research institutes, journalists and other targets, U.S. officials said. The computers in these systems were also used as relay nodes to hide the incoming and outgoing traffic of the Snake malware implanted in the targeted computer systems. Behind Snake is a hacker organization called Turla, who has been employed by the FSB for a long time.

In a years-long operation, the FBI installed its own computer code on the system to instruct Snake, causing the malware to overwrite itself and render Snake inoperable, the Justice Department said. .

“A high-tech operation by U.S. law enforcement that pitted Russian malware against itself dismantled one of Russia’s most sophisticated cyber-espionage tools, which it has used for two decades,” said U.S. Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco. This tool advances authoritarian goals.”

Computer network experts have known about the malware for at least a decade, AFP reported. The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said that the Russian FSB began developing the software in 2003 and that Snake is “the most sophisticated cyber-espionage tool in the FSB’s arsenal.” Strong, extremely difficult to detect in computer systems and network traffic.

In addition, CISA said the tool was designed to be easily updated and corrected, and “due to its high level of sophistication, programming errors are surprisingly low.” These layers have allowed the FSB to conduct espionage operations undetected for years through a vast network of mainframes, hacking into computers containing sensitive files.

The U.S. hopes that this operation will remove this set of software from the virtual battlefield on the Internet, so as to severely set back Russia’s cyber attack capabilities.

related news:

Putin showed off his muscles on “Victory Day” to cheer up people’s hearts, he rebelled and bombed and exposed Russian military secrets

The latest battle situation: The headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet was attacked. It is rumored that Europe and the United States will push forward negotiations after Ukraine’s counterattack. The EU intends to sanction 7 Chinese companies.

The latest battle situation: a repeat of the rout?The Russian army sent a two-way retreat signal, and Moscow slammed the United States for this Russian-Ukrainian representative international occasion.

Editor in charge: Lin Li

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2023-05-11 00:23:23

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