dan/california

And to bad news. As was posted above, Syrskyi several hours ago made a statement, UKR troops withdrew west from Berdychi. This was logical step after Russians managed to expand own Ocheretyne salient and capture neighbour Novobakhmutivka village and part of Solovyove. So, elements of 47th brigade had a risk to be outflanked and even semi-encircled. 
Video of Russian progress by DeepState map
Concerning to Ocheretyne breakthrow, in Ukrainian media is starting a scandal about inconpetence of brigade commanders and HQ high-officers. Approaches to Ocheretyne were well fortified - personnel of 52nd separate rifle battlion for about six months did own work well with support of engineers. But higher command decided to rotate this unit and moved it to more cal Lyman direction (yes, in conditions of personnel lack there is usual "rest" - to be moved not to rear, but to the sector with less intensive warfare). On their place 115th mech.brigade had to be moved. This is the same brigade, which personnel in May-June 2022 in mass was abandoning positions near Severodonetsk, cuasing collapse of defense. Despite since that time two commanders were substituted, by words of brigade servicemen, there are no any changes - it still one of worst brigades in ZSU. 
No proper combat training. Brigade HQ and battalion HQs were indiffernt to own duties. Officers mostly absolutely indiffernt to soldiers. One guy told, he have seen own battalion commander only two times and their company commander treated them like sh...t and did nothing what he had to do according field manuals. Actually in his company only deputy commander of morale&psychological support tried to tow all duties, including duties of commander and at least a little to prepare own personnel to fight. 
It's no clear infirmation  what happened - one say brigade command didn't control situation and didn't know battlefield, so lost control. Other - that because of disrupted control and timing, brigade elements hadn't time to seize all positions at once, so forward units, which seized them were just smashed by Russian attack, remaining without support. By the rumors 4th company was almost completely eliminated with KIA and MIA. Other personnel (which has low training and motivation levels with such attitude in own brigade) jsut didn't seize positions or just fled from it. During next three days brigade command tried to stop Russians already inside Ocheretyne, but their incompetence and throwing people to thoughless actions led to new casualties and complete dismoral of personnel. 
47th brigade sent some fire teams on Bradleys, but they couldn't save situation. Higher command decided in the midst of battle to move 115th brigade to the rear and substitute them on 100th mech. brigade (was formed from 100th TD brigade, so it almost hasn't armored vehicles and in real is infantry brigade). Until this substitution took place, Russians, having 3-times advantage in manpower here, expanded own salient and captured most of Ocheretyne. Though 100th brigade fihgts tough and could for some time slow down Russian advance, which threatened so far to grow in operative breakthrow.
But story with 115th brigade command didn't finished. There is a rumor that by old post-Soviet tradition (because in Soiviet army for such fails comamnder can turned out under tribunal) higher command decided "to punish" brigade commander... with promotion in the duty. If this true, this bastard will sit in OTUV HQ and maybe develop plans of operations, without understanding of situation and just drawing arrows on the map, shouting on lower commanders "Take this fu...g treeplant immediately! I don't care your artillery hasn't shells! This is an order!"
And other obvious reason of steady Russian successful advance - WE HAVE A LACK OF THEESE FU...G SHELLS! Mass US and EU shell supplies probably will feed the whole front only through two weeks or a month. Reportedly our artillery still be limited in fire capabilities. So, during this weeks you can expect news about next UKR withdrawals. 
PS. Just for notice. 115th was enough well-equipped brigade - it has BMP-1 (or some Eastern Europe produced analogs) and some M113.

The squad of 115th in M113. Right machine-gunner has Czechoslovakian UV vz.59 LMG

Perun discussing the new US aid package
 

Two days before, Russia conducted missile strike on Ukrainain power and gas-sharing system in western Ukraine. As result four thermal power plants got direct hits
Targets of Russian strikes:

And the scheme of attack:

 
Strike statistic:
9 Kh-101 - 6 shot down
8 Kalibr - 6 shot down
2 Iskander-K - 1 shot down
2 S-300 - no interceptions
4 Kh-47 Kinzhal - no interceptions
9 Kh-59/69 - 8 shot down
Total: 34 launced, 21 intercepted. Excluding ballistic ones - 28 launched, 21 intercepted. 
 

The Russians already knew that ATACMS could attack the bridge and since the bridge is officially still on Ukraine's territory they didn't need a green light from anyone. Ukraine could always attack its own territory with western weapons.
So explicitly stating the fact only does, as the_capt would say, enlarge the uncertainty space for Russia.
Btw, are those arches only decorative or are they a structural necessity for the bridge? I would imagine they are easier to hit than a pillar and easier to damage. Even something like napalm may weaken the strength of the steel enough.

Summary of UKR strikes on Russian objects for 27th of April:
27th of April - Russian military airfield Kushchovskaya, Krasnodar region was hit by the drone(s) storage with UMPK kits, converting dumb FABs to gliding bombs was destroyed
In the same day two refineries were hit in Krasnodar region too - Il'skiy refinery (6,6 mln tons year output) and the refinery in Slavyansk-on-Kuban' (3.9 mln tons). On both enetrprises fractional columns were hit. Both reportedly limited own work.
 
 
A fire on 719th artillery ammunition storage base near Tikhoretsk town, also Krasnodar region was marked by FIRMS on 27th of April, but unknown what caused it - drone attack or something else
Belgorod oblast - GUR in cooperation with 15th artillery recon brigade damaged antenna of Russian low-altitude 48Ya6-K1 "Podlyot" radar and diesel genarator for i, using Warmate 3.0 drones 
 

Commander Oleksandr Syrskyi's latest update:
https://t.me/osirskiy/670
 

I agree with you, unless it's a disinformation campaign designed to make the Russians pull more air defenses to defend this area so the that the Ukrainians can attack elsewhere.
Hopefully, those F-16s are ready to deploy real soon now.

The phrase "He who pays the piper" comes to mind...
BTW not everything goes directly to press from the Pentagon.
The drone attacks made by Ukraine don't..
😉

It just me or isn't it extremely disrespectful to Ukrainians that everything goes directly to the press from the Pentagon

Something, yes. Speculation by or endorsed by Shushko tends to be confected bull****.
 

Anything coming from, endorse by Sushko is entirely suspect. Caveat emptor.

Assuming it’s true, it’s a pity about GLSDB. That said, I think the MIC would be well served by turning the system into a smart cluster munition that can basically give a bunch of smaller drones an extra 150km range. So what if it gets jammed a bit? Optically guided sub-drones/munitions (don’t want to mis-something these) would obviate all that.
Many pages ago, I feel like we discussed paragliders as munitions. If your GLSDB-but-not-really drops a 100kg worth of paraglider drones from say 1kft at night, how do you even shoot all those down? Imagine if it’s 100x 1kg bomblets with parachutes and a battery and propellor and some servos for steering the chute, you could mess up a lot of stuff. Or I guess they could have flip out wings and whatnot, and that might be more reliable than a chute.

Ukrainian forces dismiss as fake information about withdrawal of Abrams tanks from battlefield due to drones
 
 

Have Ground Launched Small Diameter Bombs Been ‘Thrown Aside’ By Ukraine? - A senior Pentagon official has alluded to a recently deployed long-range ground-launched weapon suffering from Russian jamming and other issues.
 
 

You are understating how crazy this story is, whether it is true is another question, but back to that in a minute. The story is saying that the ENTIRE WAR resulted form an effort by Shoigu and Ivanov to cover the massive extent of their embezzlement. And then not content with that, they tried to take over Prigozhin's empire exactly the way they he said they did, and THIS resulted in the march on Moscow. Now Putin has finally realized what is going on. This is BEYOND NUTS. Yet Ivanov is sitting in prison for something. 
Apparently the Patrushev clan is leading the other faction at the Czars court, and think they finally have the rope to hang their rivals. This doesn't even have to be true, or mostly true, if enough of the Russian elite believe it to start a real power struggle.
I am not sure I believe any of this, but clearly a real argument about something is breaking loose between Kremlin factions. That is not a small thing.

QUADRUPLE POST, bleep me I was on a roll, sorry.

Sushko is not to be relied on.
Also, Shoigu is no political lightweight, and I wouldn't assume the siloviki can throw him under the bus even if they wished to. I doubt Prigozhin was ever his creature; the guy simply got high on himself and went rogue when Wagner was reined in.
I posted some bio on Shoigu a couple thousand pages ago. Like Putin, he was a handpicked protege of Yeltsin in the late 90s. His family background/ training is in O&G construction (with the accompanying huge self enrichment opps), more than military. He had his own political party, briefly, before throwing in with United Russia. He's NOT an army careerist, in fact Putin likes him for that very reason.

A credible report that Ukraine is pulling its one ~battalion of Abrams out of active combat because current combat conditions are making them ineffective and to vulnerable, especially drones. I am filing this one firmly in the tank is dead file.

You are understating how crazy this story is, whether it is true is another question, but back to that in a minute. The story is saying that the ENTIRE WAR resulted form an effort by Shoigu and Ivanov to cover the massive extent of their embezzlement. And then not content with that, they tried to take over Prigozhin's empire exactly the way they he said they did, and THIS resulted in the march on Moscow. Now Putin has finally realized what is going on. This is BEYOND NUTS. Yet Ivanov is sitting in prison for something. 
Apparently the Patrushev clan is leading the other faction at the Czars court, and think they finally have the rope to hang their rivals. This doesn't even have to be true, or mostly true, if enough of the Russian elite believe it to start a real power struggle.
I am not sure I believe any of this, but clearly a real argument about something is breaking loose between Kremlin factions. That is not a small thing.

You tell yourselves this…try going to a soccer game.  Hell get on a train before a soccer game.  Understatement is not how I would describe the experience.

A credible report that Ukraine is pulling its one ~battalion of Abrams out of active combat because current combat conditions are making them ineffective and to vulnerable, especially drones. I am filing this one firmly in the tank is dead file.

That is a weird way to do internal power struggles though, if it calls the reason for the war in question publically. That could have massive ill effects, or am I misunderstanding something here?

Brits do understatement.
😉
We leave all that other stuff to our American friends.... (And hyperbole to the Canucks)
Let's see how the story unfolds if any of it is true....

Someone text the grandkids and have them take the keyboard away....

A credible report that Ukraine is pulling its one ~battalion of Abrams out of active combat because current combat conditions are making them ineffective and to vulnerable, especially drones. I am filing this one firmly in the tank is dead file.