Taliessyn

I think that’s irrelevant.  They may not ask the same of Russia because Russia aren’t signatories to the Ottawa Treaty, or because they don’t think Russia will listen (basically a compliment to Ukraine), or because they’re corrupt and incompetent, etc. and so on.  None of those reasons affect the validity of the request.

Actually I might even go further than my last post: I think HRW’s plea is an example of the kind of thing which must be heard during the war.  Hearing and considering these things is how Ukraine will guard the humanity which it is ultimately, ostensibly fighting for.  It is naturally up to Ukraine how they respond and what they prioritise but there is zero benefit whatsoever to not hearing such things and every benefit (particularly post-war) to not losing sight of them.
 
Listen to Human Rights Watch.  Take a breath, remember who you are and consider what they say.  What you then decide is up to you.
 
In my humble opinion.

His faction, didn't they get rid of alongside the other Donbas warlords and leaders before 2022?
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1673346277814198275?s=19
Let's think about the implications that Wagner might have made a alliance with Luka. The man is very savvy, having balanced the EU and Russia without going the way of Ukraine. Say if Wagner didn't get disbanded, but is allowed to exist, and continue activities, it might be better to think Putin has indeed lost some control over it, and maybe therefore Luka has gained some use of them.

I have a fantastical left field theory that the objective of this “coup but not coup” was actually successful in its aims.

• What if the intention was to communicate very clearly the limits of Putins political power in a dramatic way - a succinct message to the man himself about the consequences of continuing the death spiral he is intent on steering Russia into?

• What if there actually was sufficiently widespread, embedded support - but no desire to affect the instability of a full blown transfer of power?

Supremely unlikely since the plotters would be in immense danger, but also an intriguing idea, and one that can be tested by watching Putins behaviour in the next few weeks. If it’s business as usual then that’s that, but if there is a slow rollback on some of the insanity? 

Again, most probably complete fantasy, - but I have such delight in thinking of Putin being cowed and having to play some of the puppet he has turned others into for so long.
And nothing about this makes sense. Prig is a shrewd operator. He must know the danger he is in. Forever. 

Misterious EUSV, being found on the shore near Sevastopol could be UKR experimental device: https://news.usni.org/2022/10/11/suspected-ukrainian-explosive-sea-drone-made-from-jet-ski-parts
One commentator suggested, this USV had a control via Starlink, but because Starlink is not working in Crimea and around, the vessel could lost control and throw ashore itself   

Fill yer галоши, mate!
Specs (in Russian) are at front, drawings at the back.
(I'm not a research genius -- well actually I am not bad, I just hit my event horizon of caring about the Bridge whodunnit a while ago. Anyhoo, it was embedded in some tweet or other)

Ukraine announces the liberation of several settlements in Kherson
Novovasilivka, Novohryhorivka, New Kamyanka, Trifonivka and Chervony in the Beryslav district of the Kherson region.
https://t.me/info_zp/18378
Since these are all pretty much level with Dudchany then I suspect they were essentially abandoned by Russia over a week ago, and this more a case of Ukraine moving in to what was no man's land, possibly as the start of a new push.

Long time player / lurker -
I watch SubBrief religiously on youtube, Aaron is a former submariner who has great knowledge about Navy matters - seems to think it was a barge with explosives. Nothing definitive here of course, and he probably has an ingrained bias towards a Naval explanation - but something more to throw into the pot:
(from comments: "it has been a long time but here is my take, the explosion was low yield , think ammonium nitrate-fuel oil (AN-FO). It is designed to push up rather than fragment the bridge, Lifting the section off of its supports. this explains the lack of visible damage, the burn on the top was the truck laden with ordinance.or something with bang potential and was a secondary , this explains the guard rails, large sparklers ect."
 
Also a Naval perspective on the Gas line sabotage:
 

A little like the bocage in Normandy. 

@The_Capt
I think, you judge mostly of territorial defense footage, so you might get the impression that we are fighting only with light infantry, heavy armed with modern toys. But this is because there is too few footage from our "line" units. But they fight hard with all own equipment from the tanks to BMP and artillery, though in conditions of cities defense, even these units often use "light infantry raids" tactic.
Yes, territorial defense actions are making outstanding controbution and their shoot and scoot actions release our "big army" for more hard tasks, TD work is winning a time for Reserve corps brigades and "second waves" of existing brigades deployment.    

Very good analogy.  In this case, as could be for the Ukrainians, an evolving primary role for infantry is not just to take and hold ground, it is to project friction onto an opponents system to such an extent you can break it.  This effectively makes mass a liability as it is vulnerable to its own weight.
This is evolution of light unconventional use of infantry we have been seeing for some time now.  Except now those mounted light infantry have comms, drones and portable ATGMs with a range, reach and lethality we only saw in vehicle mounted platforms.  Thing about evolutionary moments, you really don't realize what happened until it is too late. 
I suspect one could model this in CMBS right now.

The help of our ancestors. It's became knowingly, several days ago Russian forward groups, searching the ways couldn't overcome ancient Serpent Ramparts (ukr. Zmiyevi valy) near Bilihorodka village,west from Kyiv. Theese ramparts were built in 10-11th centuries against steppe nomads attacks on the base of more early fortifiacations.
They girds Kyiv outskirts from the west to southern east in several lines. This was huge alot of work in that times. Now many of them plowed up, but theese save itself and came useful again since 1000 years
   

On a smaller scale, John Wilder's Lightning Brigade in the ACW was very much doing the same thing.  Light infantry on horses, specifically NOT cavalry, armed with repeating Spencer rifles.  It was never implemented on a larger scale though in the way he wanted his "mounted light infantry" to be.  I think we are seeing the modern equivalent of the same on that larger scale.
They could move with impunity behind enemy lines and rapidly.  They had repeating rifles and would dismount and fight as infantry, the rifles being a force multiplier and could stand up to much larger enemy formations and beat them.  Then quickly mount again and move on.  Very similar.  

Lotta lessons no doubt, but at the tactical level the one I am watching for is "are highly mobile and connected light infantry upscaling and able to effectively stop heavy mech through a combination of speed, range, lethality and self-synchronization?", has "Deep Battle" become "360 Battle" in conventional warfare?
For the historians in the group, one of the last times this happened the Mongols took over most of the known planet...so there is that.

Situation on Donbas still very hard for our troops.
- Russian and DNR forces launched assault of important Avdiivka town. Since the night they heavy bombarded and shelled the town and APU positions around. Reportedly our troops shot down a jet two hours ago
- Heavy clashes around Vuhledar town. Units of 53rd mech.brigade withdrew there from Volnovakha, but Russians and DNR forces have big personnel superiority. Also right flank of Russian southerth group (58th Army) is advancing from the left bank of Dnieper in NE direction. Simultainously Russians trying to crush our defense  in Izium area to move in southern direction on Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. If this two groups will meet, our Donbas group can be encircled.
- Russians hit with a missile Karachun hill in Kramatorsk to disable TV tower. Outskirts od Sloviansk was bombed. Reportedly Su-34 was shot down yesterday over Kramatorsk.
- In Luhansk oblast Russians are heavy shelling, bombing and assaulting Siverodonetsk city. But looks like on this direcion mostly LNR troops involved with Russian air and arty support and all waves of this zomby-rush  sucсed to repel for now.
- Mariupol. Despite the desperate situation, our troops still stand and even partially pushed out enemy form some eastern city blocks. Reportedly just Azov claimed they destroyed for last day 6 tanks, 2 BTRs, 1 Tigr and captured 12 Russians. 
On the photo KORD special police serviceman guards captured Russians in Mariupol

So we are probably overdue on a discussion on what is going on at the tactical level.  I have held off trying to do an analysis because things were simply too turbulent to draw any real conclusions, still are in fact.  However, I  will offer a hypothesis of what I think is occurring and we can try and go from there.
In the west we have been watching these "Russian wars" with a lot of interest over the last 8 years. The reason for this is that we are all very paranoid of becoming a 21st century version of the WW1 generals - discovering on the battlefield that our doctrine has become completely obsolete.  In WWI at the tactical level it was machine guns and fast firing artillery at long ranges, at the operational and strategic it was railways, telegraph wires and canned food preservation.  They all added up to totally different war than anyone was expecting that included the end of some pretty major stuff like cavalry.
So in this war we have all been watching and scratching our heads as to "what just happened?"  At the tactical level back in 2014, and was confirmed in the short Azer-Armenian war, that something had changed.  The Russians had linked UAVs and massed fires at the tactical level, the Azerbaijanians mimicked this in 2020, and the effect was to be able to crush massed enemy armor formations over the horizon and then move in mechanized forces for what was essentially a "sweep up" close battle.  Everyone was expecting the same for this war.
The Ukrainians, being at the receiving end in 2014 have likely figured out that playing by the old rulebook will not work.  So my hypothesis is 1) the Russians have been trying to follow their doctrine of long range Find, Mass Fires Fix/Attrit and Heavy Close clean up to Finish, but 2) The Ukrainians have adopted tactics that negate #1.
The evidence for #1 is the fact that the Russians have appeared to stick with the BTG which is a concept with massed fires at the tactical level baked-in:
  
(https://www.globalsecurity.org/jhtml/jframe.html#https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/images/btg-image01.jpg|||Battalion Tactical Group)
In western doctrine a BG will have integral mortars and likely a Arty Bn in close support.  The Russians added 6 x MLRS to this mix and if you look at Soviet doctrine, MLRS are normally at Regimental/Div level.  This matched what we saw in the field in 2014 and 2020 very closely.
The evidence for #2 is all over social media.  The Ukrainians, learning quickly from 2014, look like they have dis-aggregated. More importantly and to the point, they have largely abandoned defensive mass but have not lost lethality.  I think the Ukrainians are still forming mass for offensive actions but the defensive is a lot of small units dispersed all over the place with weapon systems that are light, portable and have really extended range and reach; they have become the swarm the Russians are trying to hit with a shotgun.  Further, by dis-aggregating the Ukrainians look like they have turned some ideas about maneuver on its head.  Rear areas are not not "rear" anymore, it is all FEBA because small units with next gen ATGMs are cutting Russian logistics to pieces, making all the Russian mass heavily dislocated (or perhaps contributing to Russian mess ups).
We spend a lot of time slagging Russian failures, and there are quite a few and well earned, but we should also keep an eye on Ukrainian victories, because they might very well be happening on their own merits and not all on Russian screw ups.  For example, we may be seeing a lot of abandoned Russian MBTs because there are no refueling or recovery assets left due to Ukrainians adopting a new path very effectively.
So what?  Well the question is, "are we seeing an anomaly or trend?"  As we look over at our own heavy steel, we have to ask ourselves "what if our next opponent looks and fights like the Ukrainians and not the Russians?"   The answer to that question may be a blip in military force development but is also may be a signpost much in the same way 1914 was because the technology that enables the Ukrainian tactics is accelerating - smart, very long range autonomous systems that can overwhelm current mechanized protection/shield at a system level.  
Personally, I think it is too soon to call it.  There may be times ahead where mass demonstrates it merits and they may be decisive; however, it is all worth watching closely because none of us want to the a "horse cavalry commander" in the next war. 

T-64 tank was developed in Soviet times in Kharkiv, so we can say this lineage of Soviet tank is our and we can produce and upgrade it as well as T-84 -> BM Oplot -> perspective tank
We have own developments in combat vehicles BTR-4, BTR-3DA and light armored cars - Kozak-2/2M series, Varta, Novator
BMPs, some big number of BTRs still Soviet types or upgrading like BRDM-2, which became main vehicle for new-formed motorized infantry brigades.
Small-arms also still mostly Soviet or upgraded like AK-TK. Own production of PKM clones (KM-7.62) exists, but it can't supply all needs. Bullpups like Vulkan-M (other name Maliuk) is only for SOF and some recon units, also not mass weapon. UAR-10 rifles, based on Zbroyar-10 (AR-10 based) now in most cases substituted old Soviet SVD
ATGMs. NLAWs and Javelins are very useful, but we have own heavy Stugna-P and light Korsar, which alredy are in enought quantity
Artillery still all Soviet, but its capability significantly increased by adopting of digital integrated reckon&targeting system, developed by civil vilunteers. Also there is some developments in heavy MLRS guided rockets (Vilkha/Vilkha-M) - analogue of HIMARS.    

I think, US, of course shares some information, but you some underestimate our EW and SIGINT capabilities. We have own developments in this brach, which not worth than western examples and they already several years in service. We have own EW and SIGINT/ELINT units subordinated to Operative Commands as well as such units on brigade level, in recon battalions, recon companies etc. 

If you in the mood for an audiobook/ podcast series, I thoroughly enjoyed Dan Carlins 'Ghosts of the Ostfront"
He is an incredibly vivid storyteller.
http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-ghosts-of-the-ostfront-series/
 
Try his World War 1 series for free if you want to check him out.
http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-50-blueprint-for-armageddon-i/