Former Special Forces engineer says Russian minefields are unlike anything he has ever seen and battling these hidden death traps is 'exhausting'

July 20, 2023.1/2

A decorated former US Army Special Forces engineer who cleared out improvised explosives in Afghanistan and has since been tackling threats in Ukraine says the monstrous minefields Russia is laying down are unlike anything he has ever seen.

"The biggest difference is the sheer number of mines," Ryan Hendrickson, who previously served in Afghanistan with the Green Berets and is now removing deadly mines as a volunteer in Ukraine, told Ukrainian Toronto Television.

"There are millions and millions of mines in Ukraine," many put down by the Ukrainians, but significantly more by the Russians.

In one field, for instance, Hendrickson and his team found over 700 anti-tank mines, though they estimated there may have been thousands in total. That was just one field.

The Russians have "the capability to lay millions and millions of land mines, and they do," he said, stressing that "the biggest shaping factor of this war is land mines."

Hendrickson is involved with the Tip of the Spear initiative, his crowdfunded organization focused on removing land mines and booby traps in areas in the rear, areas where civilians are most at risk of being hurt or killed. In the field, he said, he and his team have encountered complex schemes where the minelayers intended to trap and maim or kill the de-mining crews, which are out in it working primarily on foot using man-portable mine-clearing tools.

Hendrickson indicated he is overwhelmed by the number of mines in Ukraine and the daunting task that lies ahead.

He said that based on what he has seen,it is plausible that Ukraine will not ever be completely de-mined. "There's too many land mines," he told the Ukrainian YouTube channel. And there's likely to be many more before all is said and done. As they are effective death traps that are dangerous and "exhausting" to deal with, mines are just not going away.

‘Hidden threats'

Land mines come in different shapes and sizes. There are anti-personnel mines and anti-tank mines, among other types, and these have been used extensively, often to potent yet tragic effect, in a number of modern conflicts. Explosive remnants of those wars can still be seen in places like Laos and Cambodia, for example.

"Land mines are extremely effective," Hendrickson said, pointing out that thousands of lethal mines can be put down in a matter of hours, creating severe problems for any advancing forces.

"You have to deal with the hidden threats, the threats you can't see that are underneath the ground," he said of the difficulties presented by mines. "Mentally, it's exhausting."…

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/former-special-forces-engineer-says-russian-minefields-are-unlike-anything-he-has-ever-seen-and-battling-these-hidden-death-traps-is-exhausting/ar-AA1e8FNO

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The retired soldier said that he and his team have encountered extremely complex minefields in Ukraine in which anti-tank mines are protected by anti-personnel mines and other explosives surrounded by booby traps. "How do you clear all of this out? It's just slow," he explained.

Human Rights Watch, wrote in a recent report on the use of land mines in Ukraine that "the use of antipersonnel and anti-vehicle mines in the armed conflict is resulting in a large, dispersed, and complex level of contamination that will threaten Ukrainian civilians and hinder recovery efforts for years to come."

'Mentally tasking'

Hendrickson described the mine-clearing process as "methodical" in his interview with Ukrainian Toronto Television.

The problem with that is while de-mining work in areas outside of combat is able to happen at its own pace, front-line combat is substantially less permissive, forcing crews to work only when they have sufficient protection or when they are less visible, such as at night.

Hendrickson recalled clearing operations in Afghanistan. "We were up in the front with our detectors clearing the path for the assaulters," he said. "It's extremely mentally tasking because not only are you worried about what you can't see underneath the ground, but you're right up in the front. Who's going to get shot first? Who's going to walk into that ambush first?"

Ukrainian forces are executing a counteroffensive push that's being hindered by mines, among other challenges, and there's growing evidence that these minefields should have been considered a more difficult threat to offensive operations.

"Any movement, offense, or counteroffense, assaults, or anything like that, the commander has to take into account land mines," Hendrickson said. If the land mine problem wasn't carefully considered before, that certainly is not the case now.

Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, commander-in-chief of Ukraine's armed forces, recently told The Washington Post that "you can no longer do anything with just a tank, with some armor, because the minefield is too deep, and sooner or later, it will stop and then it will be destroyed by concentrated fire."

And Zaluzhny isn't the only top general that has figured out that mines are a huge problem for the ongoing counteroffensive.

"The casualties that the Ukrainians are suffering on this offensive," Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff US Army Gen. Mark Milley said this week, "they're from minefields — minefields that are covered with direct fire from anti-tank hunter-killer teams, that sort of thing."

"The real problem is the minefields," he said, and if there's no change, Ukraine could find itself stuck in a war of attrition in which terrible infantry battles and artillery duels grind away at both armies.

It's the kind of warfighting Ukraine simply can't afford to engage in if wants to drive the Russians out and ultimately take back all of its lost territory, another daunting task.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/former-special-forces-engineer-says-russian-minefields-are-unlike-anything-he-has-ever-seen-and-battling-these-hidden-death-traps-is-exhausting/ar-AA1e8FNO

22 Jul, 2023 00:47

Zelensky threatens to ‘neutralize’ Europe's longest bridge

The Ukrainian leader called the Crimean Bridge a legitimate military target following an attack that killed 2 civilians

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has claimed that the bridge to Crimea is not civilian infrastructure, but a key logistical route for Russia’s “militarizing” of the peninsula, insisting Kiev was within its rights to target it using any means necessary.

The Crimean Bridge – the longest in Europe, which links the peninsula to mainland Russia over the Kerch Strait – was damaged in an explosion on Monday. The drone strike, which Moscow called a Ukrainian terrorist attack, killed a couple and seriously injured their 14-year-old daughter, who was traveling in the same car.

Neglecting to even mention civilian casualties, CNN’s Fareed Zakaria asked Zelensky at the Aspen Security Forum in Washington, DC on Friday whether destroying the bridge “completely” was Kiev’s “short-term objective.”

“For us this is understandably an enemy facility built outside the law, built outside international laws, and all applicable norms, so understandably this is our objective. And any target that is bringing war, not peace, has to be neutralized,” the Ukrainian leader stated.

Zelensky went on to say that Kiev’s objective was to “reclaim all of Crimea because it is our sovereign territory,”avoiding the host’s question whether such a grand goal could be reachedthrough an ongoing counteroffensive that has so far shown underwhelming results.

Government sources cited by Ukrainian media outlets confirmed the strike had been launched by Kiev. The SBU, the security service that allegedly co-organized the operation with the Ukrainian military, reacted by promising to release details about the incident after the conflict with Russia is over.

Crimea broke away from Ukraine shortly after the Western-backed 2014 Maidan coup, which deposed the democratically-elected Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich. Afterwards, the peninsula joined Russia, with its population overwhelmingly backing reunification in a referendum. Since then, seizing Crimea from Russia has become a top talking point for Ukrainian officials.

(Zelensky is not very smart!)

https://www.rt.com/russia/580097-zelensky-neutralize-crimea-bridge/

21 Jul, 2023 22:22

Ukraine losing ‘significant’ forces – White House

Kiev’s much-lauded counteroffensive is “hard going,” a senior US official has admitted

White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has claimed that it was too early to make a call on the results of Ukraine’s counteroffensive operations, insisting that despite losing a “significant” amount of forces, Kiev still has “substantial” reserves to throw into battle.

When asked whether “the real counteroffensive is yet to come” at the Aspen Security Forum in Washington, DC on Friday, Sullivan insisted that the counteroffensive began “the day the first Ukrainian put their life on the line.”

“There have already been significant amounts of casualties and deaths of Ukrainian fighters in this counteroffensive, so it is well underway. And it is hard going. And we said it would be hard going,” the White House adviser told the forum’s moderator Edward Luce.

However, Ukraine has a “substantial amount of combat power thatit has not yet committed to the fight,” and according to Sullivan, is now trying to choose the right moment “when it will have the maximum impact on the battlefield.”

“It is at that moment when they make that commitment that we will really see what the likely results of that counteroffensive will be,”Sullivan stated, noting that Washington is in “close consultation with the Ukrainians on the conditions for that.”

The West is evidently disappointed that despite “colossal amounts of resources” it sent to Kiev, its much-lauded counteroffensive has failed to produce any results and has led to high levels of Ukrainian casualties, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday.

Top Pentagon officials insisted earlier this week that it was too early to call the counteroffensive a “failure,” saying Washington had expected all along that the operation would be bloody and protracted. The New York Times reported last week that after losing up to 20% of the weaponry deployed in the counteroffensive in just two weeks, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky had paused the operation to shore up ammunition.

https://www.rt.com/news/580095-ukraine-significant-casulaties-sullivan/

(Gawd this guy just makes up bullshit)

CIA Chief Says Weaknesses Lie Behind Russian Defenses in UkraineJuly 22, 2023

(Bloomberg) – US Central

Intelligence Agency Director William Burns said Thursday that he remains optimistic Ukraine will be able to make advances its counteroffensive against Russia, based on the intelligence he has reviewed.

Russia suffers from some significant “structural weaknesses” behind the considerable defenses it has built up, Burns said at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado. Those weaknesses include poor morale, poor generalship and “disarray” among its political and military leadership.

“It is going to be a tough slog, but we’re going to do everything we can as an intelligence agency to provide the kind of intelligence support and sharing that’s going to help the Ukrainians to make progress,” Burns said.

Burns said that mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mutiny in June had “exposed some of the significant weaknesses in the system that Putin has built.”

“For a lot of Russians watching this used to this image of Putin as the arbiter of order, the question was does the emperor have no clothes or at least why does it take so long for him to get dressed,” Burns said.

Burns’ comments echoed remarks earlier this week by Sir Richard Moore, the head of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, known at MI6. Moore said that Putin’s government was beset by “venality, infighting and callous incompetence” and that the aftermath of Prigozhin’s mutiny had been “humiliating” to Putin.

Putin will likely try to avoid giving the impression that he is overreacting to the mutiny, while trying to extract what he can of value from Prigozhin’s Wagner network, Burns said. Still, Burns said Prigozhin is likely to see retribution from Putin at some point.

“Putin is the ultimate apostle of payback,” Burns said. “If I were Prigozhin, I wouldn’t fire my food taster.”

Burns said the mutiny presented a “once-in-a-generation opportunity” for CIA recruitment in Russia. The agency recently made its first video post on Telegram, the social media and messaging site developed and widely used in Russia, to let Russians know how to contact it on the “dark web.” Burns said the video was viewed 2.5 million times in the week after it was posted.

Burns, a diplomat before becoming the CIA chief, has emerged as a key back-channel for the Biden administration’s thorny relationships with Russia and China. He went to Moscow before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in an attempt to talk Putin’s government out of attacking and, more recently, traveled to Beijing in a bid to keep intelligence channels with China open.

Burns said that CIA has “made progress” in rebuilding its intelligence network in China after setbacks in the country. “We’ve made progress and we’re working very hard over recent years to ensure that we have a strong human intelligence capability to complement what we can do through other methods,” Burns said.

CIA launched a China Mission Center in 2021 to hone the agency’s focus on “an increasingly adversarial Chinese government.”

Burns added that Chinese President Xi Jinping and his military leadership likely “have doubts about whether they could pull off a successful full-scale invasion of Taiwan at an acceptable cost to them,” Burns said. Putin’s experience in Ukraine has “probably reinforced some of those doubts,” he said.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/cia-chief-says-weaknesses-lie-behind-russian-defenses-in-ukraine/ar-AA1e8QhE