Sources for 2014-2021

[Centurian52]

I'm thinking of making a detailed study of this war. And I mean the entire war, from the very beginning, starting in 2014. I have a mountain of sources for everything that has happened since February 24, 2022 (most of them provided, at one point or another, by the How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get thread (I've dropped out of that thread for now since I can't keep up, but one day I'm going to read every single page and follow every single link on that thread)). But I'm not really sure where to start looking for sources on everything that happened from 2014-2021. At least I wasn't sure where to start looking, until I remembered the massive knowledge base that exists on this forum. The more detail the better, but anything is better than nothing. The entire period is of interest to me, even the low intensity years. If you find interesting information about the prelude to events in 2014 feel free to post that too.

[TheFriendlyFelon]

Hey mate, 
If you need any more information about the active war, let me know. I might also be able to provide some lesser known information about the low intensity conflict from 2014-2022. I've got a few contacts currently in the country and several others who have left, but all of them spent a significant amount of time in Ukraine before and during the invasion. I'm not really sure what exactly you are looking for, but if you need info on something specific, shoot me a DM with questions and I'll send you back any info I've got. If I don't have any information, I'll ask my contacts and see what they know.

[Centurian52]

18 hours ago, TheFriendlyFelon said:

Hey mate, 
If you need any more information about the active war, let me know. I might also be able to provide some lesser known information about the low intensity conflict from 2014-2022. I've got a few contacts currently in the country and several others who have left, but all of them spent a significant amount of time in Ukraine before and during the invasion. I'm not really sure what exactly you are looking for, but if you need info on something specific, shoot me a DM with questions and I'll send you back any info I've got. If I don't have any information, I'll ask my contacts and see what they know.

I'll DM you with my email address so you have a place to send anything you have, but I'll put what I'm looking for out in the open. And if anything you have is the sort of thing that can just be posted as a link on this thread, that's probably better than sending it directly to me (provided that isn't a problem for whatever contact you get the info from). That way other people that may be interested in this period can read it.

I'm really not looking for anything specific. In fact the point is that I don't want to leave any part of the war untouched in my studies. That means covering events that occurred before the Russians escalated the war into a full scale invasion in Feb 2022 (I already have masses of sources for post Feb 2022, to the point that it would take me more than a day to go through everything I have for any given day (if no one beats me to it I could probably write a book with all this information (but who am I kidding, someone will probably beat me to it))). The kind of information I'm looking for is basically the same as what we're looking at for the Feb 2022-present period. Which is to say anything tactically, operationally, or strategically significant. What actions took place between which units, when, and with what result (ground gained, casualties), what equipment was present and in what quantities, which settlements were captured by which side and when, any relevant machinations between political figures or people in high command, any overall casualty or vehicle loss estimates for a given period, or anything else in this period you think might be of interest to a military history nerd. For the Russian invasion of Crimea details like where Russian troops were landed, how many were landed, what equipment they landed with, what routes they took to what objectives, any information about any clashes they had with Ukrainian forces in Crimea. How the initial fighting in the Donbass broke out, what battles were fought and what their outcomes were. Once things settled down into low intensity warfare I suppose relevant events would be things like raids or exchanges of artillery fire, and whether they resulted in any casualties or anything else significant.

The more granular the better, but a higher level picture would also be appreciated. Haiduk has already provided a bunch of information, mostly on the initial fighting in 2014, which I'm slowly working on translating, but I don't want to just rely on one source. Even if something you provide basically says the same thing as something in what Haiduk provided, that's still useful since it means the two sources are corroborating each other (no one source is ever 100% reliable, but when multiple sources are in agreement you may be on to something).

[TheFriendlyFelon]

Copy. Honestly, for just a broad picture of things, Wikipedia has a lot of information if you start with the 2014 Crimean Crisis and follow the timeline and click the available reference links. As far as granular military engagements from 2014-now, I will see if any of my people know somebody who participated in any of the noteworthy engagements. Alternatively, Ukrainian news sites will have basic articles about the smaller engagements, and some longer articles about the larger ones. I have a bunch of those translated and saved somewhere. I'll start looking for them tomorrow.

[TheFriendlyFelon]

https://liveuamap.com/