Do you enjoy watching Russian airplanes getting blown up by drones from Ukraine? Has President Volodymyr Zelenskyy got a treat for you! Ukraine launched a stealth attack inside of Russia on Sunday, with smuggled-in first-person-view kamikaze drones hitting targets as far from the Ukrainian border as Siberia. The day before Russian-instigated peace talks in Istanbul, too. Who’s holding the karty now?
The attack blew up at least 41 Russian planes on five different military bases — Amur, Irkutsk, Ivanovo, Murmansk and Ryazan — destroying what Ukraine claims was 34 percent of Russia’s air fleet. And two bridges collapsed too. Making it even better, the planes were Tu-95 and Tu-22 strategic bombers that carry long-range missiles, and an A-50 spy plane, all irreplaceable because they’re made from cannibalized parts of planes left over from the old Soviet Union. Some of the Russian planes dated as far back as the 1950s, and still had propellers. So the lost Russian planes were worth somewhere between $100 million each and priceless, while Ukraine’s drones that destroyed them cost about $600.
And, Ukraine planned the attack for a year and a half, and pulled it all off without a single leak, and without letting the White House know. Smart move, given that the whole world knows Trump would immediately tell Vladimir Putin during one of their late-night chats where they dare each other to hang up first, and how very unclear the Pentagon has been on OPSEC, with Pete Hegseth nonstop blabbing things he has no business talking about.
Ukraine smuggled in 117 drones hidden in the roofs of wooden cabins. Then the roofs all opened remotely and the drones did their stuff. Watch!
Look at how these drone operators can strike with precision, it’s wild.
And by the way, Zelenskyy says that the headquarters for the attack were in an office next to the local FSB headquarters in Chelyabinsk, sending the strong message that Ukraine can get up in anywhere.
The drone attack comes a week after Russia launched its largest attack on Ukraine yet, because what do you know, Trump making peace by doing nothing but Truth Socialing “Vladimir, STOP!” and other impotent foot-stomping did not work to curb his imperialist ambitions. Putin even promised Trump and NATO that he would generously come up with a “peace memo” letting everybody know what his ceasefire terms are, as if everyone does not already know it is all of Ukraine, and then Putin did not even bother to performatively produce that. Instead he took a shot of caviar, and Russia launched a record 479 drones and missiles over the Ukraine border.
Russia is mad, big mad about the attack, of course. The Defense Ministry confirmed the attacks and called the operation a “terrorist act,” even though the attack was on military planes at a military base, unlike Russia’s preferred targets like hospitals and residential blocks of civilians.
Putin himself has been quiet since the attack, though, releasing only a pre-recorded statement about the 70th anniversary of the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
Meanwhile, Russian and Ukrainian officials met in Istanbul today, though without Putin, Zelenskyy, or any Americans.
Russia’s delegation was led by Vladimir Medinsky, the guy who two weeks ago sneered and snarled at a negotiator who lost his nephew in the fighting, “Maybe some of those sitting here at the table will lose more of their loved ones,” and then he threatened to annex even more of Ukraine. Great peace talks! Oh, to have been a fly on the wall today! Reportedly the two sides have now agreed on a prisoner exchange.
Hey remember that time Trump promised to end the war in Ukraine in 48 hours, and the time he, JD Vance and Marjorie Taylor Greene’s gross boyfriend yelled at Zelenskyy for not wearing a suit in the Oval Office, and Trump blathered, “You don't have the cards right now. With us, you start having the cards.”
What do you know, turns out Ukraine holds some cards after all! Good thing, as America has left the casino.
[BBC]
BLOWED UP REAL GOOD
"You don't have any cards."
There you go, Trump is playing Uno while Zelensky is destroying Russian bombers.