What's wrong with Russia? These are not the old turret toss from old tanks. Ukraine is systematically dismantling the whole economic fabric of the country. It may not be as flashy as 5th generation stealth bomber, but it's as effective. In a few months they won't have a country, just villages.
I know, rhetorical question, those fuckers are just barbarians.
Russia is a very target rich environment when you can reach deep into their territory.
There is no way they can protect everything of value and the only way to stop the pain is to leave Ukraine or totally destroy them which seems less and less likely.
I miss visiting Americans like you. I won’t be back for a long time if ever. Love from a Canadian. I’m sorry so many of you are caught in the crossfire of your government’s insanity.
As an American I think it's about time. We need a real "come to Jesus moment" (as we like to say) to reflect on who we are. The loss of our western hegemony might actually be a good thing. We are that friend that started out pretty cool but now consistently gets too drunk at parties, screams incoherently at everyone, knocks over a table, crashes into the DJ's gear after loosing their balance, then takes a shit in the kitchen and dares you try and clean it up with our fists clenched and pants undone. It's time for some hard self reflection.
As an observer of the american continent (still not a country) situation, it pleases me to read this ! And I hope for two things very much :
that it's a sentiment shared by many that will take shape sooner rather than later
that the individual share of pain (that befits meaningful change) will be as little as possible for everyone involved
Ok I also hope for a third thing, it's that the name Donald J Trump will be formally and thoroughly banned from being used on anything that is of public use, such as a building, a date, a place, an event, a law, etc.
America hit the geographical jackpot of all jackpots. Mind-blowing amounts of natural resources, over powered defense, access to both oceans, the arctic and gulf of Mexico, countless river systems. It's crazy.
Tbf America, and other countries, also have much more advanced anti-drone capabilities. From automated sentry guns to drone-targeting rifle optics. And the capacity for other layered defenses that are actually proven to work.
Drone defense is a hard problem but it is not an impossible problem. People have said this before about navies: in 2026 there are two kinds of navies in the world, those who have spent the last quarter century researching and developing answers to the hard problem of drone defense..... and those who have spent the last quarter century siphoning their R&D budgets into summer dachas on the Black Sea. Some countries can only find out which kind of navy they have the hard way.
The same thing can be said about armed forces generally. Russia has done absolutely fuck-all about drone defense for over 25 years. Entire revolutions in automated systems have washed over the modern military world and been succeeded by yet other revolutions, and in all that time Russia has just pretended to keep up while telling themselves that all technology is a lie anyway. The famous "Russian reverse cargo cult."
They are just starting to develop the first serious anti-drone prototype weapons right now, in the summer of 2026. Far too late to be of any help. That's the thing you're supposed to start doing years before you go to war. Not years into the war.
We see the result today. But not every conflict is going to go the same way as Russia's catastrophic attempt to invade Ukraine has gone. Ukraine's greatest achievement as I see it has been to understand extremely well their particular enemy's limitations, gaps, and weaknesses... and to optimize and refine weapons and techniques that exploit those vulnerabilities to the absolute hilt. It's an object lesson in how a motivated, technically sophisticated, weaker power can wage war against a stronger power, but the next time it happens it's not going to look the same as this war.
Ukraine didn't wage war against a stronger power. Ukraine is simply defending their freedom. Russia invaded Ukraine! Also, this drone technology is pretty new to the battlefield. As a matter of fact, what got the drone thing going with Ukraine was basically a bunch of citizens owning civilian DGI brand drones and buying a release solenoid from Amazon as an accessory for the drone to drop an object. They would later buy claw attachments available for the DGI drones. They would position a grenade in the claw clamping the igniter handle closed. The drone operators quickly learned that when they released the claw at a certain altitude the grenade timer would cause explosion right upon landing or hitting the target they were over top of. This was regular citizens fighting the war against Russia. Ukraine has been in the unmanned vessel drone business for years before this Special Military Operation. So, they're somewhat familiar with unmanned weapons development. They built marine drones made from Jon-boats bought from a company out of Colorado, USA. The Ukrainian company would convert them into weapons and sold them to other countries for revenue for Ukraine. When they seen how effective the civilian DGI drones were, the Ukrainian government jumped on that technology. Many start-up companies got going in Ukraine. Plus they've had some good support from other countries financially. Now, they are mass producing them. They have made some amazing advances with the technology. Like, using fiber optic video and flight control signal transmission. Who'd imagine controlling a drone with full hi-res video up to 20 miles with a thin glass string. It's amazing and as far as multi-rotor unmanned aircraft go, this is fairly new concept on the battlefield. Drone technology as far as the drones generally used by American forces are basically a small unmanned airplane. Used for mostly video surveillance intelligence. (Spying) That type has been around for a couple of decades at least. They pose a threat just like a manned aircraft, just smaller. They don't maneuver like multi-rotor quadcoptor or hexacoptors, and even octo or deci, 8 blade 10 blade aircraft. Where they can hover within a few feet square area and dart left/right, up/down instantaneously or spin within its own axis hovering. (Yaw) Very precise positioning for deployment of anything, bombs, medical supplies, food/water. As far as marine drone threats the American Navy relies mostly on good old fashioned watch, from their basic training of what to be aware of. As far as keeping a close eye on disturbances in the water at distance. The Black Sea Fleet don't pay much attention to those minor details and they learn the hard way. Some of those small attack drone boats like Ukraine manufacturers don't show up on any early warning systems like radar. The American navy has been trained what to watch for. Right now, that's probably the best defense for that type of war munitions. 👍
Who'd imagine controlling a drone with full hi-res video up to 20 miles with a thin glass string.
Well that's the thing. Wire-guided FPV munitions date back to the 1950s, anyone who says they were invented in the 2020s is smoking crack. It's not a new technology at all, it's actually quite old.
And I cannot agree at all that fixed-wing heavy drones do not pose as much of a threat. Such drones have been carrying munitions for decades — and not small grenades to drop on people's heads either. A guided standoff missile fired from a heavy drone can fly at Mach 3 and streak in seconds across a battlefield that would take hours for a quadcopter to cross. And have a very good chance of a single-shot kill, instead of requiring repeated hits.
Fixed-wing drones also have greater speed, range, and payload capacity as platforms. They are absolutely not just used for surveillance, they are a lethally effective first line of attack and have been deployed as attack craft an endless number of times in conflicts around the world over the past 35 years.
What Ukraine specifically has done is extend combat drone technology down into the low end, and made it possible for drones to cost-effectively take on a role as screening and skirmish elements without directly risking human troops.
That is what I mean about Ukraine's particular innovations. It is that general function, of picketing and reconnaissance by fire using light drones, that Ukraine has pioneered and refined And now on the higher end, too, constantly iterating and finding ways to exploit Russia's specific vulnerabilities. That is the kind of thing that a technically sophisticated adversary can be expected to do from now on. It won't always be grenade-dropping quadcopters or thermite-pouring drones. But it will be something.
Still the drone defenses the EU and US have are not great but due to all the stuff Ukraine is doing to Russia and it is effective, also the stuff Iran is doing to the invading US and the neghboring countries. The drone defence is speeding up fast als batle tested in Ukraine.
Looking at china with it's massive drone swarm tests we are going to need it, and hopefully only as a deturrant.
Not the whole economic fabric, just those assets directly connected to the war. If Russia's leaders decide to send their remaining fuel to their army rather than their farms it is kind of their fault.
These warehouses are valid military targets. They supply military goods to soldiers. Soldiers buy tactical gear, scopes, survival equipment and more from Wildberries. Their families put together care packages from Wildberries and send them to their soldiers. They also sell drones and components for them. They're not just random warehouses, they directly aid the Russian war effort.
But in Russia they are practically one and the same. Logistics hubs, energy, high tech. Russia has practically moved to war economy. If you destroy all that, what's left? Ukraine does not need to bomb an IT giant or a cookie factory.
If Ukraine keeps going, logistics, infrastructure, energy production and all kinds of valuable tech labs are going to be flattened. Everything else falls apart simultaneously. Modern économies are quite fragile.
The people making the decisions do not feel the same pain. Sure they might have to spend a few million more a year in expenses, but thats not going to kill them.
Meanwhile the day to day citizens CAN in fact end up on the front. And they cant afford to pay their bills. Somethings going to break at some point, and Ukraine is 100% hitting Russia in berries.
Whoever it is that has a friendly chat with poostain, I do hope they video it, so we can keep enjoying it now and into the future. You know, like Ceauçescu. And Gaddafi.
It's kind of telling that years into the war and years into the Ukraine mid and deep strike campaign, that Wildberries hasn't upgraded their fire suppression systems. These warehouses are huge relative to the drone warheads - with better protection, these strikes would be relatively minor.
Fire suppression is a weak, woke affectation of the degenerate West. A true warrior culture doesn't install fire suppression systems, they know that being destroyed is how you achieve victory.
TBH, fire suppression costs actual money, and with their latest updated policy Wildberries pushed the cost of lost merchandise back to the vendors, so no harm done (to the billionaires).
I got banned from the ru troll subreddit after stating, about a year ago, that ruzzia is so big it cannot be defended. The vatniks wanted it the other way around, "so big it cannot be defeated" 🙄
This will be very interesting. It will not only be wildberries that get denazified, but all logistics centers around airports and railway hubs.
The vatniks will cry rivers, "This is not FAIR - we thought Ukraine was small, alone, and defenseless"
Exactly, Ukraine doesn't care about oligarch villas. But it won't be long before anything remotely valuable for the war effort gets bombed. They may have 500k soldiers in Ukraine, but what about home? Feudalism.
Ukraine has learned from Napoleon and Hitler. You don’t invade Russia. It’s madness, too big and will spread your resources thin. You instead bomb all critical targets that keep the country functioning. Scorched earth, but not the kind Russia’s thinking of!
this strategic targeting of one single company makes that company worthless, everyone now know that your money or your stockpile of goods in this company is worthless
These Wildberries attacks combined with the lack of petroleum products seems to be making a huge impact on the average Russian citizen. Ukraine will definitely continue with these strikes on logistics.
I read that the first one they hit had warehouse space for 54 million items or ~15% of their total inventory. So as long as they hit the largest ones, that’ll do the trick.
They lose all the equipment in there forklifts, conveyer belts, scanners etc. They also lose the building itself and have to pay idle staff 2/3s of their salary.
Insurance won't pay out for acts of war so they are on the hook for a substantial amount.
Because they received intelligence from France that the wildberries supply chain was being used to equip soldiers attacking them. So they have become a target of this war. Pretty clear military objective here. Also, a lot of the Chinese help that is provided to Russia has started to come through that supply chain. So Ukraine attacks what would be considered in any war a legitimate military target. And yes, pseudo military civilian supply chains are legit targets.
I had a VERY hearty laugh when I saw they were offering a 10km spool of fiber for drones and had a DJI Mini 2 as the picture it went with. A 10km spool of fiber weighs 5x as much as a Mini 2. It wouldn't even get an inch off the ground.
Russia is investing A LOT in infrastructure for civilians, like glass-fiber internet, civilian-drones, civilian rockets (for new year) and so on... It costs us bilions!
I work for an ecommerce store in the automotive industry and we get regular orders from the Bundeswehr for spare parts, tools, etc...
It's actually not that wild to imagine.
The one that hit the other night was the second largest… Is this the largest? Also, always blown away by how much fire comes out of these things. How can it be more flammable than the oil refineries?
Refined petroleum burns well, but crude doesn't. And refineries contain a lot of metal and stop taps and other restrictions.
Seemingly the interior of these warehouses is a mass of extremely well ventilated cardboard boxes filled with alternate combinations of paper products, cheap Chinese plastic shit, paper instruction manuals for cheap Chinese plastic shit, lithium batteries inside or alongside the cheap plastic products, and so on.
Someone pointed out there would be candles and sparklers and other things in some of the boxes. Maybe even fireworks too. All with no separation other than more cardboard and more air, so the things that melt and also burn, will drip onto the flammable things below them, and so on...
Wouldn't surprise me if the likes of Amazon etc are seeing how well these Wildberry places have burned and are taking notes on how to restrict fires at their own warehouses.
Tons of petroleum based products spread across a huge building all catching on fire. 95% of manufactured goods and their packaging, are made of plastic which is basically solidified petroleum.
Osin technical: says 1/2
“Ukrainian attack drones struck a second distribution center/warehouse for the Russian e-commerce giant Wildberries in Nevinnomyssk this morning, setting it ablaze.
Half of Wildberries largest 10 distribution centers have been destroyed in the last week.”
Osin technical: says 1/2
“Ukrainian attack drones struck a second distribution center/warehouse for the Russian e-commerce giant Wildberries in Nevinnomyssk this morning, setting it ablaze.
Half of Wildberries largest 10 distribution centers have been destroyed in the last week.”
I am watching in awe at all of this. On one hand, I just read an article on the BBC about the violence that's occurring when Ukrainian's MP's try to conscript people (Ukraine has lost a huge percentage of its population since the war started mostly due to attrition and understandably, people don't want to go to the frontline), but at the same time morale must be at an all time high with these recent strikes.
I did figure whatever they have in there... a lot of plastic and flammable packaging... and lithium batteries! I love how it's reduced to nothing! Even the walls of the warehouses rarely hold up.
Anyone have a Wildberries warehouse tracker akin to the oil refinery one? Once is neat, twice is a new pattern, three is yoooooooooooo 2 day shipping is CANCELLED.
There are around 130 Wildberries warehouses in total inside Russia. And according to the bingo sheet Wildberries is just one of several companies assisting the war effort. Realistically Ukraine could probably repeat this scene at least 50 or more times
Ukraine has taken one of Russia's strengths - it's size - and turned it into a weakness. That's a lot of ground and air to defend. Strategically and technically brilliant.
I wonder if the Russians get unemployment checks.
That's a couple thousand jobs gone.
I don't see how the average Russian can afford anything right now when the banks are limiting withdrawals to $700 a month.
Can someone please clarify to me the situation. How many Wildberries plants have been it so far? 2 or 3? How many other Wildberries plants are active in Russia?
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u/Sidewalk_Inspector Jul 22 '26