At a news conference, German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said the attempted terrorist attack had been planned and carried out professionally, adding that the attack involved “a high level of technical expertise and considerable organizational effort.”

Dobrindt added that the Aug. 4 incident bore the hallmarks of a “familiar pattern of Russian hybrid operations in Europe.” He said available information pointed to people acting “on behalf of Russian state authorities,” referring to them as “low-level agents.” Dobrindt did not name the suspects or explain why investigators linked the attack’s organizers to Russian intelligence services, saying that the probe was ongoing and required “the highest level of information protection.” Later that evening, Die Zeit reported that Germany’s federal prosecutor’s office was pursuing a case against two defendants.

German investigators believe the first suspect served as a logistics coordinator and instructor for the planned attack. According to Süddeutsche Zeitung, NDR, and WDR, he entered Germany in late July through Berlin’s Brandenburg Airport, then drove in a rental car toward Leipzig. Two days before the attempted attack, he departed Germany via the airport in Berlin.

The second suspect was identified through DNA found at the scene of the crime — on the inside of a tin can containing explosives, and on an antenna mounted on a tree near the airport. A check of the samples against European databases produced matches in Lithuania and Finland. Investigators determined that the suspect had entered Germany on an Italian tourist visa, which they believe was issued in late April by the Italian consulate in Minsk.

Investigators are reportedly skeptical about the chances of bringing the suspects to justice. In past instances, including after the 2015 hack of Bundestag servers, German authorities were unable to detain agents who did not return to Europe. Meanwhile, experts from the BKA, Germany’s federal criminal police office, say it is possible that drones in addition to the three found at the airport may have been used in the failed attack.

Meanwhile,  the Russian Embassy in Berlin called the incident a “hastily concocted provocation,” claiming it was concerned about a “new wave of anti-Russian hysteria” in Germany.

On Sept. 1, German authorities for the first time formally blamed Russia for the events in Leipzig while announcing the closure of Russia’s consulate general in Bonn and the Russian House in Berlin in response to the incident.

What do we know about Volna Kupol Garant?

News of a Russian military system called “Volna Kupol Garant” began circulating this past June, with Ukrainian communications and electronic warfare specialist Serhii “Flash” Beskrestnov one of the first to report its existence. Around the same time, footage began appearing on social media showing Ukraine’s destruction of similar systems.

The complex consists of several trailers with satellite antennas. Beskrestnov described how it works: The antennas “look” into the sky, toward a passing Starlink satellite, and emit interference toward it so that it cannot receive signals from ordinary terminals. Eight such dishes were enough, he said, to “deafen” a satellite and destabilize terminal operation across an area of about 20 square kilometers.

A TASS source in Russia’s defense industry later described the same operating method for Volna Kupol Garant: a “narrow, directed” signal that “blinds the receiving antennas of satellites.”

“Several devices can close off an entire region. Dozens of devices switched on simultaneously could cause a temporary collapse in Starlink’s operation,” the state news agency quoted the source as saying.

In an interview with Spain’s El Mundo, Ukrainian troops acknowledged that Russian electronic warfare systems of this sort reduce the effectiveness of Starlink, which has been widely used by the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) in recent years. Ukrainian serviceman Ihor Lutsenko described the creation of Ukraine’s own satellite communications system as representing the most reliable solution to the problem.

After that report, the Kremlin-aligned Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper quickly rushed to label Volna Kupol Garant a “Starlink killer.” But the system is far from that.

The system’s actual effect

The system’s effectiveness has predictably been exaggerated by the Russian side, analysts at the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) wrote last week. Experts interviewed by The Insider agreed with the ISW’s assessment.

Volna Kupol Garant has several major limitations:

• It is not mobile
• It costs about $1.5 million per system
• It has a relatively small coverage area

The relationship between the presumed cost and range makes the system financially unsustainable, said Dr. Thomas Withington, an associate fellow at the UK’s Royal United Services Institute (RUSI):

“Twenty square kilometers isn’t that much. It’s a range of 2.5 kilometers, which is nothing. And $1.5 million dollars to jam 20 square kilometers — that’s very expensive. How many thousands of square kilometers of the occupied area is there? How many of those systems are you going to need, taking into account its cost? This isn’t really a solution. And even if you cover 20 square kilometers — it’s not much. You just fly around the jammer.”

The claimed coverage area of the Volna Kupol Garant is indeed in line with the capabilities of tactical electronic warfare systems already used by Russia’s armed forces, said Anton Zemlianyi, a senior analyst at the Ukrainian Security and Cooperation Center. From that standpoint, he explained, it is not a fundamentally new threat. Scaling up production also does not mean the balance of forces on the front will change as a result. What matters is how Russia integrates the systems and how quickly Ukraine adapts to them.

Zemlianyi said such systems will most likely initially be placed near critical sites in temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories and in border areas.

“That will probably become the main task, since Russia will not be able to create continuous electronic warfare coverage over large areas,” he said. “Mass saturation of the front and rear areas with such systems would require significant resources.”

Still, both Zemlianyi and Samuel Bendett, an expert in the U.S.-based research organization CNA, acknowledge that the system has proved effective on some parts of the front. That is supported by Ukrainian troops’ own accounts of interference with Starlink terminals, including in the El Mundo report.

Bendett also noted another important nuance: by emitting a jamming signal, Volna Kupol Garant itself becomes a “powerful beacon.” Like many combat systems that emit signals, including some types of radar, it becomes detectable, trackable and, ultimately, a target for enemy strikes.

A Starlink “killer”?

Russian state media and military bloggers (1, 2, 3) have emphasized that the system acts against the source of the signal: the Starlink satellite itself. Ukrainian bloggers have also reported about this, but military analysts are skeptical of such claims.

“Personally speaking, I don’t believe that claim of the Russians,” Withington said. “The reason why I don’t believe it is because you’ll need a very, very powerful signal to affect a satellite in orbit. Those satellites orbit the planet about a thousand kilometers above. To get the signal there, it must be very powerful. Think of this as running a marathon: before the marathon [runners] eat a lot of food, they drink a lot of water, but at the end of the marathon they’re very weak and exhausted. It’s the same with radio signals. For the signal to be powerful enough to jam a signal in space, you need a huge amount of power on the ground. And it not only  needs to reach space, but also do the damage.”

Withington also noted that such a powerful signal could reveal the location of the systems, and its generation would place an extremely heavy load on electrical systems that they may not be designed for.

There is still no solid basis to claim that Volna Kupol Garant can directly affect the operation of Starlink satellites in orbit, Zemlianyi said. Such electronic warfare systems can jam or distort a satellite signal, limiting the effect of the satellite system for the user on the ground, but they do not interfere with the satellite itself.

“The main task of such a system is to create interference and overload the necessary frequency range,” Zemlianyi said. “Simply put, it creates ‘white noise’ over a specific area. That can either make it harder for a terminal to receive the signal or interfere with the satellite’s ability to receive the signal transmitted by the terminal. Roughly speaking, this can be compared to a classic electronic warfare system affecting the communications channel between a relay and a strike drone. As a result, the drone may lose a stable signal, its control channel, or data transmission.”

A jammer for export

The TASS source in Russia’s defense industry also hinted that Moscow is considering selling technologies like Volna Kupol Garant abroad.

“The most interesting thing is that Russia reserves the right to spread this technology among all interested countries around the world. Tools of similar purpose and power have already appeared in China. This is only the beginning,” he said.

CNA expert Samuel Bendett called the statement about selling such systems to Russia’s partners around the world “concerning.” The Financial Times recently reported that Moscow since at least 2023 Russia has secretly helped Tehran develop and produce supersonic cruise missiles. Russia has also been suspected of helping Iran carry out drone strikes on CIA facilities in the Persian Gulf region.

Police in Essen said they were proceeding on the assumption that the incident was the result of a “deliberate act, a criminal offense.” The affected units were Neurath G and F and Niederaußem H, G and K. Most were feeding electricity into the grid at the time of the incident. Energy company RWE, the owner of the affected units, expects to return 2.6 GW of the capacity to service on Wednesday and the remaining 1.6 GW over the weekend.

Earlier on Sept. 1, unidentified attackers used homemade projectiles to damage several power lines in eastern Germany, causing a temporary outage at LEAG’s coal-fired power plant in Jänschwalde.

Authorities are investigating whether the incidents in western and eastern Germany are connected. Herbert Reul, interior minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, said at a news conference on Wednesday that investigators were considering two theories in connection with the attack in western Germany: sabotage ordered by a foreign state, and left-wing extremist activity. Police in the eastern state of Brandenburg opened a case that includes suspicion that the perpetrators are guilty of forming a terrorist organization.

Germany has already faced attacks on energy infrastructure and other civilian objects. In early January, a major arson attack in Berlin caused a large-scale power outage, with the anarchist group Vulkangruppe (lit. “Volcano Group”) claiming responsibility. Then, earlier this week, German authorities directly accused Russia of carrying out a hybrid attack by placing a drone near a Ukrainian transport plane at Leipzig/Halle Airport in early August. “We do not view Leipzig as an isolated event, but see it in conjunction with other hybrid actions,” commented Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul. The Russian House in Berlin and the Russian consulate in Bonn will be closed in response to the incident.

Leonhard Gandi, a researcher at the Fraunhofer Institute, told Bloomberg that the grid handled the incident well and that the situation would become critical only in the event of simultaneous attacks on several facilities or key grid nodes. That is why, he said, the “truly alarming news” was the attempted sabotage against the power lines near Jänschwalde.

As Herbert Saurugg, an expert on blackouts and president of the Austrian Society for Crisis Preparedness (GfKV), explained to The Insider, Europe’s transmission grid operates under the N-1 criterion. That means the failure of a single element — a power line, transformer, or generating unit — can be offset by rerouting reserve power flows and balancing energy.

“To overwhelm these buffers, an attacker would have to take several critical components out of operation simultaneously and across different grid regions,” Saurugg said. “Recent incidents of sabotage have shown that even a 3,000 MW outage was manageable. What is decisive, therefore, is not only the absolute scale, but also the combination of simultaneity, geographical distribution, and attacks on key nodes. However, there is no guarantee that this would also be achievable in a different scenario. This is because unexpected events can always occur in addition, which could then lead to a cascading failure.

A large-scale power cut caused by targeted attacks is technically possible, but not straightforward. There is simply no such thing as 100% security. And that is the far more crucial point. It is therefore not just a question of how we can slightly improve security through even more measures, but rather a question of how we, as a society, can prepare for such potential scenarios in order to deal with the consequences as effectively as possible. After all, this is also a factor that is relevant to potential attackers: is it even worth the effort if the impact remains manageable? We should take this more seriously in order to become more resilient as a society in the face of any disruptions.

The key factors are the simultaneity of events, the critical status of the affected components in the grid, the current grid load and reserves, as well as the speed and coordination of the countermeasures. Ultimately, luck or bad luck always plays a part in whether the safety measures take effect sufficiently and quickly enough, or not. It is therefore more a question of resilience, as the Ukrainian people have been impressively demonstrating to us for years.”

Christian Rehtanz, the Head of the Institute of Energy Systems, Energy Efficiency and Energy Economics at the Technical University of Dortmund, added that there have been situations in which the pan-European interconnected grid, of which Germany is a central part, split apart into separate sections:

“There have repeatedly been situations in which the European interconnected grid — at the core of which lies Germany — has broken apart. In those cases, however, the individual sections continued to operate stably, and there were only minor supply interruptions. Because of this networked, cross-border structure, it is therefore very difficult — and hence rather unlikely — that a large-scale outage could be triggered in a targeted manner. This would only be possible through the most massive attacks at many locations, including across national borders. Mere disconnections can be restored quickly.

Physically destroying equipment is naturally more critical, but it also requires the massive use of explosives. And the greater the effort needed to cause a disruption, the higher the likelihood of being detected in the process. This is why the current attacks are more like pinpricks, intended to demonstrate that attacks are possible.”

This past February, a court fined Moniava, the head of the Lighthouse Charity Foundation, 45,000 rubles ($500) for the administrative offense of “discrediting” the army by making three posts on Telegram.

In February 2022, shortly after the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Moniava signed an open letter to Vladimir Putin in which representatives of Russian NGOs called for an end to the war. Moniava’s social media accounts regularly featured posts reflecting on the war (which she calls a war, not a “special military operation” — itself is grounds for possible criminal charges) and on the repression taking place in Russia. In June, Moniava wrote that she had disconnected her doorbell because of anxiety:

“In Russia we have our own triggers — the sound of a doorbell or a knock at the door. I’ve heard this from many friends and acquaintances who have had people ‘come for’ them, or who are afraid that people ‘will come for’ them. After such visits I asked friends never to ring my doorbell, but to message me on WhatsApp when they’d arrived. Then I disconnected the doorbell entirely, so that it would never ring again, because every courier delivery resulted in panic.”

Moniava also wrote that she had visited Alexei Navalny’s grave on his birthday:

“Unfortunately, very few voices inside Russia now speak out for the truth and against the war. That’s why each voice carries such a high price. And that road leads to prison. And, increasingly often, to the cemetery.”

As Moniava's lawyer Mikhail Biryukov told the Slovo v Zashchitu project, the investigation intends to arrest her. According to Biryukov, the criminal case was opened over a 2023 Telegram post marking the anniversary of Russia’s invasion. The head of the children's hospice faces up to 10 years in prison on charges of spreading “fake news” about the Russian military, motivated by political hatred.

Zelensky stated:

“Today we want to warn every airline that uses Russian airspace, every insurer, and everyone who is still using key Russian airports: Russian skies are becoming completely unsafe. Ukraine is not threatening civil aviation as such — not a single civilian aircraft. It’s simply that there will be drones in Russia’s skies, and that fact has to be reckoned with. Even though Russian authorities are not reporting this properly, Russian skies will de facto be closing: the war Russia started is closing the country’s own sky.”

According to Zelensky, Kyiv does not intend to cause civilian deaths, which is why it is issuing warnings in advance that there are no longer any safe “windows” in Russian airspace. Zelensky urged ambassadors working in Ukraine and in Moscow to take note of his warning and inform their capitals, and the same warning applied to carriers that fly to airports in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and other key Russian destinations. The Ukrainian president added that his country’s Foreign Ministry and competent authorities are willing to provide international bodies with complete data on the threats while stressing that civil aviation cannot safely fly under the circumstances.

In August, The Atlantic described a proposed Ukrainian plan to paralyze Moscow’s aviation hub. Citing two sources, the outlet reported that earlier in the year Zelensky was offered an operation, codenamed M&Ms, which involved using up to 1,000 inexpensive, identical AI-guided drones to overwhelm Russian air defenses in a single night and shut down the skies over Moscow to international flights for an extended period. The idea was to cut off links between the Russian elite and the outside world by making it impossible for them to fly to Istanbul and Dubai. The proposed aim was to push the Kremlin toward negotiations to end its ongoing war. According to The Atlantic, Zelensky feared that a Ukrainian strike on a civilian airliner inside Russia would be seen as “piracy,” but he authorized preparations for the operation. However, implementation came to a halt in July with the dismissal of the operation’s architect, Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov.

Still, Ukrainian drone attacks continue to paralyze Russian airports on a regular basis. According to aviation authorities, airports across the country suspended operations 114 times from June 28 to July 28, with at least 17 of those episodes occurring at Moscow’s four airports. The Association of Tour Operators counted more than 290 cases in the first quarter of 2026. The so-called “carpet” flight restriction regime typically lasts several hours before services resume. Last week, the Russian military reported shooting down 791 Ukrainian drones in a single night — according to Moscow’s mayor, more than 600 of them were headed toward the capital region.

Sputnik and RT, which are accused of spreading Kremlin disinformation, were blocked in the EU shortly after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. But RSF found that OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude, and SpaceXAI’s Grok, which is integrated into the social media platform X, agreed to bypass those restrictions and reproduce material from sanctioned media outlets when prompted to do so.

According to RSF, which carried out testing in June and August, the chatbots “produced comprehensive summaries of articles on international news, retrieving headlines and sharing links and verbatim excerpts without consistently mentioning that the media outlets in question were under EU sanctions.”

The only chatbot that refused to carry out such requests was Meta AI — demonstrating, as RSF writes, that sanctions compliance is possible from a technical standpoint. Notably, chatbots including France’s Vibe (formerly Le Chat, developed by Mistral) and Google’s Gemini initially resisted showing sanctioned content but eventually provided it after repeated requests from RSF.

OpenAI, responding to the organization’s concerns, said it took the investigation’s findings seriously and planned to “look more closely” at the information provided.

“Given these circumstances, the EU sanctions are failing to achieve their objective,” stated Vincent Berthier, head of RSF’s technology and journalism desk, in a news release.

RSF is calling on Brussels to open an investigation in order to determine the extent to which OpenAI is violating its obligations to prevent systemic disinformation risks in ChatGPT. It is also urging the EU to launch infringement proceedings against the other AI agents.

The Insider previously reported on how popular chatbots give users around the world distorted facts and Kremlin propaganda narratives in response to questions about the war in Ukraine, along with other topics of international politics.

The German arm of the company, Priminer Werkzeugmaschinen GmbH, is based in Neumünster, while production is based in China. Die Zeit obtained a list of over 100 clients that received equipment from Priminer’s “official representative office in Russia” between 2021 and 2024.

Among the recipients were an entity belonging to the Almaz-Antey defense concern, which received a machine with a Siemens CNC system in December 2023; ENICS, a Kazan-based drone maker, which received two machines in June 2023; and the Kurganpribor plant, which produces components for grenades, rocket artillery systems, and guided missiles and received a shipment in September 2023. All three companies were already under U.S. and EU sanctions at the time of the deliveries.

In February 2024, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Priminer Russland (lit. “Priminer Russia”) for supporting Russia’s military-industrial complex. However, the company’s German and Chinese divisions were not placed under restrictions, and documents show that after the sanctions, Priminer did not stop doing business but instead simply changed its branding. In April 2024, an employee of Priminer’s Russian dealer, Pumori, based in Yekaterinburg, wrote to colleagues that deliveries would continue under the “Evolution” label.

The correspondence shows that, under that name, 17 V17L machines, renamed Evo-7, were supplied to Burevestnik, a sanctioned manufacturer of artillery guns. In November 2025, Priminer Russland itself changed its name to High-Precision Technologies (while keeping the same taxpayer identification number).

Siemens confirmed to Die Zeit that it supplies products to the Priminer divisions in Germany and China. The company cited contractual guarantees that its equipment is not used for deliveries to Russia and end-user declarations from its Chinese partner. At the same time, Siemens acknowledged that it “cannot always be ruled out” that individual goods reach Russia without the manufacturer’s knowledge and said it had opened an internal review.

Lawyers for Priminer’s German division told Die Zeit that the company had not violated sanctions or export control laws and was not legally connected to Priminer Russland, which they said is governed exclusively by Chinese law.

The Insider previously found that equipment from more than 6,000 foreign companies is being supplied to sanctioned Russian companies via China, Turkey, India, and the United Arab Emirates. Approximately 4,000 of those companies are registered in China.

In January 2025, the Pentagon included COSCO on its list of companies linked to the Chinese military. In April of that year, the U.S. Naval War College published a report stating that the People’s Liberation Army likely uses China’s fishing and merchant fleets for purposes of intelligence and surveillance. Chinese law requires companies in the country to assist the state with intelligence-gathering efforts.

Christopher Sharman, director of the China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI) at the U.S. Naval War College, speaking in his personal capacity and stressing that his comments do not necessarily reflect the views of the U.S. government or the Department of War, told The Insider:

Over the past decade, Beijing has passed and revised numerous national-security laws. Beijing can likely use these laws to justify a broad range of restrictions, demands, and punitive actions on PRC and foreign companies as well as individuals. Many of these laws are vaguely worded, giving PRC authorities considerable latitude in how they are interpreted and applied.

COSCO Shipping Corporation Limited is the PRC’s largest state-owned shipping conglomerate. If Beijing wanted to leverage COSCO vessels or personnel in support of intelligence-collection activities, these national security laws would likely provide a legal framework through which the government could direct or compel cooperation.

One feature of China’s state-owned maritime sector that is particularly relevant is the presence of political commissars aboard PRC oceangoing commercial vessels, including those operated by COSCO. If the PRC government sought to direct a COSCO vessel to support intelligence-collection activities, the political commissar would provide an established Party presence aboard the ship through which such requirements could be communicated. 

The political commissar serves as a Party-state representative aboard the vessel and is responsible for political and administrative affairs, including implementing PRC laws and regulations, conducting political work, maintaining the Party organization aboard the ship, and advancing broader national objectives. The political commissar shares senior authority aboard the vessel with the captain, who is primarily responsible for ship operations.

COSCO operates a large fleet of commercial vessels around the world. That global presence could provide Beijing with access to maritime environments and locations that would otherwise be more difficult to reach using dedicated government or military vessels. The same global reach that makes COSCO commercially valuable also makes its fleet potentially valuable to Beijing for pursuing national-security objectives worldwide.

Interior Minister Dobrindt said the perpetrators and organizers of the “hybrid attack” acted on behalf of Russia:

“Taken together, police investigations, patterns of attack, and intelligence findings point to Russian responsibility for the attempted attack at Leipzig Airport,” Dobrindt said. “The German government therefore concludes that Russia is responsible for the hybrid attack in Leipzig on August 4.”

Foreign Minister Wadephul added:

“We do not view Leipzig as an isolated event, but see it in conjunction with other hybrid actions. The Russian leadership has deliberately decided to further worsen our already very strained relations.”

Wadephul announced that Russia’s consulate general in Bonn would be closed on Sept. 18 and that the agreement governing the Russian House in Berlin would be terminated in response to the incident in Leipzig. He also promised continued support for Ukraine and announced tighter controls on Russian citizens entering Germany.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Moscow would respond to Berlin’s decision in standard fashion:

“Moscow will respond to all anti-Russian actions. They [the German authorities] invented a pretext. At the same time, Berlin itself is completely stained both by fueling the Ukrainian conflict and by participating in terrorist attacks against civilians… The Russian House had long been bothering them, so they were looking for something to latch onto.”

In an interview with the state-controlled news agency TASS, Igor Chaika, the head of the government agency Rossotrudnichestvo, suggested that the Goethe-Institut in Moscow could be closed:

“We won’t go beyond Rossotrudnichestvo’s jurisdiction, but we wouldn’t be surprised if the principle of reciprocity affects not only the Goethe-Institut in Russia but also, unfortunately, many other bilateral initiatives.”

Russian-German intergovernmental agreements directly link the Russian House of Science and Culture in Berlin (as the Russian House is officially known) to the Goethe-Institut’s work in Russia. After the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Moscow restricted the Goethe-Institut’s operations, including by blocking the German cultural center’s bank accounts in Russia. 

According to the U.S. Justice Department, Gruber organized the illegal export of more than $540,000 worth of U.S.-made ammunition produced by a Nebraska company and another supplier in Tennessee, routing it through JFK International Airport in New York. The shipments were declared for export to Italy, where the ammunition was required to remain as per official documents. Instead, prosecutors said, the cargo was routed to Russia via Kyrgyzstan.

The case also involved Sergei Zharnovnikov, the owner of a Kyrgyz arms distributor, who previously pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 39 months in prison. A key piece of evidence consisted of correspondence found on Zharnovnikov’s phone in which the men discussed breaking up shipments of 100,000 rounds into smaller orders in order to avoid attracting the attention of customs officials.

Joseph Nocella, Jr., the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said Gruber had been “held accountable for his scheme to send military‑grade ammunition to Kyrgyzstan before reexporting the ammunition to Russia to support its war effort.”

Gruber had served as commercial director of Bignami S.p.A., which bought ammunition for sniper rifles from Nebraska-based Hornady Manufacturing under a U.S. export license, then rerouted the shipments to Russia through Kyrgyzstan, bypassing permit requirements that the ammunition remain in Italy. The Insider previously identified Gruber’s business partners.

From 2022 to 2024, Russian companies including Arsenal, Artemida, Ve-Kasa, Promtekhnologiya, and Tetis received Hornady ammunition. In 2023, Politico Europe found evidence that Hornady ammunition had been used by snipers from the Wagner Group, the Russian state-funded private military company co-founded by the late Yevgeny Prigozhin. The Insider later found that the company’s ammunition was being used by snipers from the 155th Naval Infantry Brigade of Russia’s Pacific Fleet.

Gruber’s case is not an isolated incident. In August 2025, U.S. authorities seized more than $250,000 and dozens of weapons components and accessories after arresting Maxim Larin, a 44-year-old U.S. citizen from Plantation, Florida who owned several small American companies selling firearms parts. On Aug. 25, 2026, the U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York accepted Larin’s guilty plea on charges of conspiracy to violate the Export Control Reform Act and the attempted violation of the Arms Export Control Act.

According to prosecutors, Larin and an accomplice in Russia organized shipments of weapons components to Kazakhstan, including trigger mechanisms for semiautomatic firearms, charging handles, and laser rangefinders of the sort used by snipers and artillery spotters.

The investigative bureau Tri Trace Investigations found that from 2009 to 2014 Larin had owned the Russian gun store Shooter’s Shop. In 2012, before leaving the Russian business, he also opened a gun store in the United States. Larin’s former Russian store continues to operate under the iShooter brand. The store’s website has an “international shipping” section listing Express Mail Shipping as its logistics partner. The store’s current owner, Albert Goncharov, is also listed as an employee of Larin’s U.S. company.

The third asset in a year

RSA has taken over Dielectric Cable Systems (DKC), the Russian business of Italy’s Adventus International S.r.l. According to the company’s website, DKC JSC is one of the largest manufacturers of cable support systems and low-voltage equipment in Europe. Last year, DKC reported net profit of around 9 billion rubles ($111 million). 

It is not the only profitable asset to have been transferred to Razvitiye Stroitelnykh Aktivov in the past year. In addition to DKC, the company has also taken over:

• the Russian assets of Danish group Rockwool, which owned four plants producing thermal and acoustic insulation materials in Russia
• the Russian business of Dutch Akzo Nobel, a paint manufacturer.

Notably, RSA is a relatively young company. According to available data in the corporate data platform SPARK, it was established in September 2025 and received its first foreign asset — the Danish one — just before New Year’s, a little more than three months later.

A little-known company and businessman from Ufa

Nothing is known about the founders of RSA (that information is hidden in SPARK). There is also no information about its staff. The company ended its first partial year of operation with a loss of around 160,000 rubles ($1,843). Its sole listed employee is CEO Timur Rustemovich Amirov, a 33-year-old native of Bashkortostan.

In data examined by The Insider, Amirov's employment history since 2016 includes work at the Development Corporation of the Republic of Bashkortostan. In July 2021, for example, he had food delivered from Yandex Eats to his workplace at 46 Tukayev Street in Ufa — the same address as the corporation and of the Bashkortostan government.

Amirov built his career with the help of his father, Rustem Amirov. From 2020 to 2021, the elder Amirov headed Ufa’s municipal Specialized Department for the Repair and Maintenance of Artificial Structures (SURSIS), and before that he had spent more than nine years running Bashkortostan’s Road Maintenance Enterprise No. 104. The elder Amirov also made headlines, but in connection with a criminal case involving the abuse of office related to irregularities in equipment procurement. In April of this year, a court sentenced him to two years in prison (albeit on a suspended sentence).

Another curious detail about the younger Amirov is his black Tesla Model Y bearing the patriotic license plate S999VO. The plate previously belonged to a Chevrolet Niva operated by the public amenities service of Ufa’s Oktyabrsky District. In spring 2022, the Niva was bought by its current owner, who transferred the plate to his electric car. In 2026, the Tesla bearing the “SVO” plate was photographed on the streets of Moscow.

The business activities of the 33-year-old Amirov have developed beyond just Ufa. He is a beneficiary of the Leningrad Region-based LLC Cirkut, which trades in electrical equipment, and until 2024 he was a co-owner of the St. Petersburg-based trading company Spetsmash. None of this, however, would seem to have prepared him to take control of a multibillion-ruble business comprising the assets of foreign companies.

The Rostec trail

Earlier this year, The Bell offered its own answer to the question of who might ultimately benefit from the activities of RSA. Citing a source close to the Russian government, the outlet wrote that Rostec structures are behind Razvitiye Stroitelnykh Aktivov. Another source told The Bell that when RSA was taking over the assets of Danish company Rockwool, he saw a letter bearing Putin’s instructions that the business be transferred specifically for the benefit of Rostec, which is headed by longtime Putin associate Sergei Chemezov.

The Rostec theory is also supported by the business activities of the younger Amirov’s previous employer, the Development Corporation of the Republic of Bashkortostan (KRRB), which works with investors in the region on turnkey projects, helping them with paperwork, site selection, information support, and other matters.

Rostec has several key manufacturing enterprises in the region. These include NPO Stankostroenie in Sterlitamak and the Kumertau Aviation Production Enterprise (KumAPP), part of the Russian Helicopters holding company. When cooperation with Russian Helicopters was just getting underway in the region, the Bashkortostan government set up an interagency commission whose members included representatives of the Development Corporation of the Republic of Bashkortostan.

The corporation also operates several industrial parks in the republic and the Alga Special Economic Zone, often serving as a link between businesses and the regional authorities. Timur Amirov’s younger brother, Almaz Amirov, is listed as the corporation’s deputy director for capital construction.

Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey justified the decision by citing the need to increase the country’s economic pressure on Moscow:

“The UK and our allies must step up our international cooperation to expose sanctions evasion and disrupt the financial networks fuelling Russia’s aggression.”

The department’s press release is largely devoted to the operations of the A7 crypto network, which was placed under restrictions in the UK this past May. British authorities issued the network the country’s first-ever nationwide warning against sanctions evasion.

London has also decided to double the maximum fine for evading financial restrictions. Previously, the maximum penalty was set at half the amount obtained through the violation; now it can reach 100%.

The UK government continues to add Russian financial institutions such as Ozon Bank to its sanctions lists, along with “shadow fleet” vessels and defense industry enterprises. Since the start of the year, the sanctions list has grown by 500 companies and individuals.

Leningrad Region governor Alexander Drozdenko claims that dozens of schools, kindergartens, hospitals, and other social facilities received threats. He called what happened an “information terrorist attack.” According to him, the “enemy” is trying to sow panic by disrupting Knowledge Day — the traditional first day of school on Sept. 1. Drozdenko did not specify, however, who exactly sent the messages or how he arrived at the conclusion that there was a single organizer behind the threats.

In Tatarstan, medical institutions under the regional Health Ministry began receiving anonymous emails starting at 8:00 a.m. The hospitals underwent a partial evacuation but returned to normal operations after inspection. In the Altai Krai, patients and staff were evacuated from the regional diagnostic center, and the anti-terrorism commission reported a wave of threats against social, administrative, and educational institutions.

Authorities in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug stated that after the buildings had been inspected none of the threats had proven to be actionable. Bomb threats against schools, kindergartens, and hospitals were also received in the Perm Krai, the Kemerovo and Orenburg regions, and the Zabaykalsky and Krasnoyarsk krais. There has still been no evidence presented publicly indicating that the geographically dispersed threats came from the same sender or group of senders.

Meanwhile, several museum venues in Moscow suspended operations. The Pushkin Museum announced a temporary closure and canceled tours for a period of four hours, the Museum of the East closed its main building until approximately 1:00 p.m., and the Museum of Moscow and all its branches stopped admitting visitors until 2:00 p.m. The ROSIZO branch on Petroverigsky Lane also suspended the exhibition “Art Behind Closed Doors: Leningrad Apartment Exhibitions of the 1960s–1980s.” The Pushkin Museum, the Museum of the East, and ROSIZO cited “technical reasons,” while the Museum of Moscow cited “reasons beyond our control.” None of the institutions officially linked the closures to the wave of bomb threats.

The mass sending of false threats has happened in Russia before. In February 2020, unknown individuals reported bomb threats against more than 1,500 sites in Moscow in a single day, including schools, hospitals, courts, and every metro station in the city’s network. No bombs were found, but around  8,000 people had to be evacuated.

Also in 2020, at the request of the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office, Roskomnadzor blocked access to Protonmail after the Federal Security Service (FSB) claimed its servers had been used to send threats to 830 sites. The FSB had previously blacklisted the Startmail service, which it claimed had been used to send more than 1,000 bomb threat emails targeting over 16,000 sites. Russian security agencies have not yet named the parties responsible for the current wave of messages.

Putin: Was it interesting at the North Pole?

Balanchukov: Incredible.

Putin: Fascinating. Did you see any polar bears?

Balanchukov: Yes, of course. We saw two.

Putin: Two? Big ones?

Balanchukov: Huge.

Putin: Can you imagine there are orcas living nearby, and they eat these bears like small fry. They just attack in a pack and tear them apart. It’s all very interesting. That’s how the food chain works. Children need to be told about this too, so they understand what kind of world we live in and why we’re conducting the special military operation.

To call Putin’s account fascinating would be an understatement. No cases of orcas hunting polar bears have ever been documented.

As recently as July 2026, an article appeared in BBC Wildlife Magazine: “Can Any Animals Kill a Polar Bear?” by Melissa Hobson. The orca is named first among the six contenders, but as the article makes clear, the only “evidence” of such encounters has all been AI-generated:

“If any Arctic species was to try to take on a polar bear, killer whales might have a good chance of success. After all, orcas are extremely intelligent and are even known to hunt and kill blue whales.

There are different types of orcas, known as ecotypes, which have different characteristics. Bigg’s killer whales – also known as transient orcas – hunt mammals and are known to travel to the Arctic. These massive mammals can grow to more than eight metres and 6,600 kg (females reach around seven metres and 4700kg). Could they be a match for a polar bear (the very largest of which can sometimes grow to around 800kg but usually weigh between 350 and 600kg)?

Perhaps they could, but this is only speculation. There are no confirmed records of orcas hunting polar bears (although plenty of fake AI videos trying to spread this false news).

Similarly, there’s no documentation of polar bears hunting orcas. Nor is there scientific evidence of polar bears eating orca flesh – although that’s not to say that these scavengers wouldn’t tuck into the energy-dense blubber if they came across a killer whale carcass.

One reason we haven’t yet seen orcas and polar bears coming to blows could be because of their different habitats. Although both are found in the Arctic, polar bears spend most of their lives on sea ice while killer whales avoid the ice because they might get trapped.

Will climate change put the two in each other’s path more often – and who would come out the victor? That remains to be seen.”

The article’s author states that the only creature that can kill a polar bear is another polar bear — or a human.

Following Putin’s meeting with teachers, the independent Russian environmental outlet Kedr.media published an article titled “‘No one eats them’: Zoologists on Putin’s claim that orcas ‘eat polar bears like small fry.’” The resulting report cited the expert opinions of professional zoologists (all of whom chose to remain anonymous when discussing the president’s factual error). The article states:

“Contrary to the Russian president’s claims, orcas do not eat polar bears, Kedr learned upon speaking with two zoologists who specialize in marine mammals...

‘Absolutely no one preys on polar bears. They’re at the top of the food chain,’ one of the scientists told Kedr. ‘And so are orcas. The only thing they might theoretically compete over is that both polar bears and predatory orcas feed on seals.’

The zoologist notes that the two species could technically encounter each other, but the only hypothetical scenario in which an orca could eat a bear, or vice versa, is if one of the animals is already dead.

‘You could imagine an orca carcass washing up on shore and polar bears eating it. But that’s about it. Honestly, there is really nothing to comment on here, simply because there have been no cases of an orca attacking a bear,’ the zoologist says.

Scientists note that neither orcas nor polar bears have any natural predators, apart from humans.

‘The only enemy of the polar bear is humans — the human presence in the Arctic. And that really is a serious threat to the species’ survival. The same goes for orcas. People affect them by depleting their food sources — primarily fish — and through tourism. This year, once again, we’re seeing dozens of vessels chasing orcas off Kamchatka. So the human-caused threats they face really are shared,’ one of Kedr’s sources says.

Another scientist suggests that the president may have formed his impression of orcas and polar bears from AI-generated videos: ‘AI enthusiasts have churned out this kind of footage and dumped it online. They post a lot of similar nonsense — like orcas rescuing seals on their backs, or the other way around, fantastically pulling someone out of somewhere. There is similar content with other animals: lions and wolves living together as one pack, bears and other animals sleeping in the forest in an embrace. Seriously speaking, though — orcas, like all predators, prefer to attack prey they’re familiar with and know how to handle. That could be seals, walruses, or fish, depending on the group’s dietary specialization, which depends on the region where they live. But it’s not polar bears.’

Another zoologist with field experience notes on social media that orcas and polar bears use the same habitats, but there are no actual observations of them interacting. And theoretical speculation, the zoologist writes, should not be presented as fact — ‘not until there are observations in the wild.’” 

Among those profiting from this construction are entities linked to oligarch Vladimir Yevtushenkov, the family of State Duma deputy Sergei Kolunov, major regional businessmen, and a company connected to the brother of a Presidential Executive Office staffer. These individuals and entities are featured in an investigation by the independent outlet Vot Tak, which examined developers’ project declarations and financial statements.

Yevtushenkov’s AFK Sistema holds the controlling stake in construction company Etalon Group, which in turn is closely tied to the Republican Construction Company (RSK). According to Vot Tak’s calculations, Russian state-controlled VTB bank has already allocated RSK more than 26.5 billion rubles ($305.5 million) for construction in occupied Mariupol, Luhansk, and Henichesk, meaning that entities linked to Yevtushenkov are among the largest recipients of mortgage construction loans in the regions seized by Russia. In addition, employees of Yevtushenko’s AFK Sistema can buy RSK apartments through a special program offering a discount and interest-free installment plan.

RSK and Etalon tend to downplay the ties between them. In June 2025, the Russian-appointed head of the so-called “Luhansk People’s Republic,” Leonid Pasechnik, announced the signing of an agreement with RSK, describing the company as part of the Etalon group. Eight minutes later, the mention of Etalon disappeared from the post, and Russian state media later removed the reference as well.

Vot Tak interprets this caution as part of an effort to shield Yevtushenko from Western sanctions. In May 2025, the businessman filed a lawsuit with the EU court seeking to have the restrictions on his business activities lifted — and publicly available information linking his entities to construction in Russian-occupied Ukraine would seriously hinder his chances for success.

Another major developer in Mariupol is the Sadovoye Koltso group, founded by Sergei Kolunov, a State Duma deputy from the ruling United Russia party. Before being elected to parliament, Kolunov transferred his stake in the firm to his wife, and then to his son, Ilya, who now heads the company.

Sadovoye Koltso entered Mariupol in October 2025 and is now building more than 80,000 square meters of housing there — more than any other company. VTB has offered the group a credit line of over 12 billion rubles ($138 million). Its projects include the Dom u Morya residential complex on the Sea of Azov coast and Sadovye Kvartaly near the site of the destroyed Azovstal plant.

Kolunov, meanwhile, serves as deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Construction, Housing, and Utilities. As Vot Tak notes, the member of parliament must have been apprised of numerous complaints from Mariupol residents who found themselves unable to obtain equivalent housing after their previous apartment buildings were rendered uninhabitable by the Russian military. Anti-corruption expert Ilya Shumanov called the situation a potential conflict of interest: Kolunov takes part in shaping policy for an industry in which his family’s business operates.

The largest recipient of loans specifically in Mariupol is SU-2007, a company owned by Viktor Budarin, a banker from Russia’s southern Kuban region. According to the investigation, his company received roughly 19 billion rubles ($219 million) for the construction of more than 170,000 square meters of housing.

YugStroyInvest, owned by Rostov developer Yuri Ivanov, ranks second with about 18.4 billion rubles ($212 million) in loans and nearly 150,000 square meters of housing under construction. In the summer of 2026, Ivanov signed an agreement to build housing and infrastructure in occupied Donetsk and Makiivka, with a stated investment volume of more than 100 billion rubles ($1.15 billion). 

The top recipients of loans in Mariupol also include the Yevtushenkov-linked RSK and Voronezh-based Proekt Invest, owned by Nikolai Stupin. Other major players include Maxim Radchenko’s Antares, Tatyana Antipova’s Transyuzhstroy, Artem and Natalya Martynov’s Evolyutsiya, Andrei Slashchuk’s Vertikal Yug, and Mirastroy, linked to one of Moscow’s biggest developers, Pavel Te.

In total, according to Vot Tak’s calculations, Russian state banks have allocated at least 61.4 billion rubles ($707.8 million) for the construction of apartments in Mariupol. The outlet estimates developers’ potential combined profit from these projects at more than 18 billion rubles ($207.5 million).

Even more housing is currently being built in the occupied part of Luhansk Region — almost 600,000 square meters. The largest recipient of loans there is Vyacheslav Semenkov’s Zhilstroyinvest, which has been allocated around 18.9 billion rubles ($217.9 million) for building 205,000 square meters of housing in Luhansk. Ukrainian journalists have previously reported on Semenkov’s possible ties to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) and to Leonid Pasechnik’s inner circle.

Next on the Luhansk list is RSK, with loans of about 17 billion rubles ($195.9 million), and another 15.7 billion rubles ($181 million) was allocated to the Moscow-based company Everest by PSB, the key bank for Russia’s Defense Ministry, in order to build a residential complex of about 136,000 square meters in Luhansk. Before the war, Everest had not built any major residential complexes independently, limiting its activities to capital repairs and installation work.

The company was founded by Begali Nurgushiev, former head of the investigative department of Kalmykia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs, who had previously received a suspended sentence for abuse of power. Everest is now headed by his son, Bulat Nurgushiev.

Bulat’s younger brother, Azamat Nurgushiev, works for the Presidential Executive Office. According to Vot Tak, in 2020 he was an assistant to the deputy head of the Foreign Policy Directorate, and he now holds the position of referent in the secretariat of the head of the Presidential Executive Office. His former boss, Denis Agafonov, heads the Expert Directorate, which prepares analytical materials for Vladimir Putin.

Construction in the occupied territories is not only profitable in itself but is also underpinned by state support, which includes a “free economic zone” regulatory regime that is set to remain in effect until 2050, exempting market participants from property tax and from the federal portion of profit tax for ten years. Developers can obtain project financing at around 3% annual interest and lease land almost for free, without tenders.

According to Vot Tak’s calculations, the profit margin of individual residential construction projects in Mariupol can exceed 30%, compared to the nationwide average of 7–15%, as estimated by experts surveyed by the outlet.

Reconstruction of the seized territories is being overseen by Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin, who also chairs the supervisory board of the Territorial Development Fund responsible for granting companies free economic zone participant status.

Khusnullin is known for distributing these benefits to his long-time acquaintances, including Pavel Te, whose affiliated entities received more than 1 billion rubles ($11.5 million) for construction in central Mariupol. The Insider previously found that during Khusnullin’s tenure at the Moscow mayor’s office, he and Te made repeated trips to France together on a private jet. Yevtushenkov, who is neighbors with Khusnullin in the upscale suburban Moscow district of Serebryany Bor, received lucrative Moscow city government contracts for years.

The construction boom has coincided with a massive redistribution of property in Mariupol. Homes damaged or destroyed during Russia’s assault on the city have been torn down, and the land has been handed over for commercial residential complexes. Former owners are being offered compensation of up to 70,000 rubles per square meter, while the median price of new housing reaches 170,000 rubles per square meter.

In addition, Russian authorities declare apartments “unclaimed” if their owners have failed to register them with the national Rosreestr property registry. According to the BBC Russian Service, by August 2026 Russian officials in the occupied territories had confiscated or placed on lists for seizure more than 34,000 properties belonging to Ukrainian nationals, including 14,000 in Mariupol.

A “diluted” Trump vs. the “pure” version

There is a striking contrast between Donald Trump’s first and second presidencies.

His inner circle during his first term consisted largely of technocrats pursuing an institutional approach to government. They saw Trump as a big child and themselves as the wise "adults in the room" who could keep the president under control. Inexperienced as he was, Trump listened to advisers even when they repeatedly blocked or sabotaged his initiatives. However, that did not save him from two impeachments — one over his abuse of power in his dealings with Volodymyr Zelensk, and the other after the events of January 6 (by which point most of his remaining political allies had abandoned him).

After miraculously surviving an assassination attempt in July 2024, Trump came to feel his own mortality while simultaneously claiming to be convinced that he had been spared for a revolutionary mission. “God saved me to make America great again,” he later declared.

During his second term, Trump stopped listening to anyone but himself and assembled his team primarily on the basis of personal political loyalty. In doing so, he sought to eliminate the managerial chaos, leaks, and inefficiency that had plagued his first term.

Today, almost no one can tell Donald Trump “no.” The traditional independence of the intelligence agencies has been eroded almost beyond recognition, and Trump openly demands that the Justice Department investigate his political opponents. Meanwhile, investigations into Trump himself — a regular feature of his first term in the White House — have become virtually unthinkable.

The Republican majority in Congress effectively withdrew from governing the country during the first year of “Trump 2.0.” Congress made permanent the tax cuts that will leave the country with trillions of dollars in additional debt and raised no objections when Trump launched a war with Iran despite his failure to consult the legislative branch. Finally, Trump blocked $400 billion in spending that had been approved by Congress, a clear violation of the Constitutional principle that places the government’s purse entirely in the hands of Congress.

The U.S. Supreme Court, despite its 6-3 majority of Republican appointees, has not always sided with Trump. For example, the court declined to abolish birthright citizenship and struck down most of the tariffs Trump imposed on imports from around the world. Still, even before his second term, the court recognized broad criminal immunity for presidents, sharply reducing the risk that Trump could later face prosecution over decisions and actions taken while in office.

Perhaps most importantly, under Trump 2.0 presidential power has been so openly transformed into personal enrichment that it borders on corruption — from the aircraft gifted to Trump by the Qatari government to the billions earned by his family through opaque deals during just the first year of his second term. There has also been unprecedented interference in private business, as when Trump demanded the resignation of Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan over his alleged ties to Chinese companies (even if, after Tan met with Trump at the White House and explained himself, the threat disappeared). In the end, the administration reached a deal under which the government would acquire nearly 10% of Intel in exchange for financial support.

Presidential power has, for the first time, been so openly transformed into personal enrichment that it borders on corruption

The New York Times editorial board has distilled these developments into a 12-point “autocracy index” that covers everything from Trump's circumvention of the legislature and pursuit of political opponents to suppression of dissent and the use of power for personal gain. Still, elections have not been abolished, and independent centers of power have survived — precisely where Trump’s vulnerability begins.

The patriarch’s autumn

However weak Congress may appear, Republicans’ once-total submission to Trump has begun to weaken. They fear losing control of one or even both chambers in the midterm elections if they continue to back the president unquestioningly, and they have even dared to vote for a resolution calling for an end to the war with Iran.

As during Trump’s first term, the courts remain the most effective check on executive overreach. In addition to the Supreme Court rulings mentioned above, a series of decisions by lower courts has blocked key elements of Trump’s immigration and tariff policies from being adopted. The judiciary has also prevented Trump from firing a member of the Federal Reserve Board and restricted a number of political appointments at the Justice Department that were made in violation of proper procedures. As a result, Trump has discovered that, although the system of checks and balances has been significantly weakened, the president still cannot act with complete disregard for the will of the other branches of government.

Finally, public opinion has turned sharply against Trump. His already low approval rating continues to slide, with two-thirds of Americans saying they disapproved of his job performance as of mid-August. Democrats, despite being consumed by their own internal problems, have begun to recover in the polls.

The economy has traditionally been a Republican stronghold, with the party positioning itself as the champion of low taxes. But in an August Reuters/Ipsos poll, voters gave Democrats a narrow edge over Republicans on economic issues: 38% to 35%. At the same time, a majority said they trusted neither party to handle the economy.

Under the circumstances, Trump's endorsement is no longer a guarantee of victory in GOP primaries. Even if most of Trump's preferences prevail at the polls, as of August roughly a dozen Trump-backed candidates had lost their races to represent the party in Congressional and gubernatorial elections this November. 

Endorsement no longer guarantees victory in Republican primaries

“Trump will naturally begin to lose influence, especially after the midterm elections,” an unnamed White House adviser acknowledged in an interview with Reuters. Meanwhile, presidential historian Douglas Brinkley told the agency that Trump’s leadership style is a “mess” that will not produce results, regardless of which party controls Congress following the midterms.

As summer draws to a close, current forecasts fairly confidently predict that Republicans will lose the House of Representatives, while it remains unclear which party will control the Senate. On Aug. 25, the prediction market Kalshi put the odds of Democrats taking the House at 86% while giving Republicans a 53% chance of retaining control of the Senate.

The outcome will play a key role in Trump’s ability to govern going forward. If the Republicans retain control of both chambers, the president will have another two years to pass legislation and confirm judges. Trump is already being called the de facto speaker of the House, and a Republican victory would only strengthen the president’s influence over Congress.

However, if Democrats take the House, they will be able to block most of Trump’s legislative agenda, and the budget will become the subject of constant bargaining. Democrats will also gain the power to investigate the administration, subpoena officials to testify at hearings, and demand documents. A Republican-controlled Senate, however, would allow Trump to continue pushing through appointments and blocking initiatives originating in the House.

If the Republicans lose control of both chambers, legislative gridlock will be compounded by serious difficulties in confirming administration officials and federal judges. Trump’s main tools will be executive orders, the power to veto legislation passed by Congress, and direct control of the federal bureaucracy. At the same time, a Democratic Congress will be able to use the budget, investigations, and legislation to constrain the White House. This is the scenario with the greatest potential for an open confrontation between the branches of government — and for Trump to test the limits of his own powers even further.

No holds barred

A weakening of Trump’s political position will not necessarily constrain him — quite the opposite. There are sound theoretical grounds for that conclusion.

In 2018, political scientist Marc Shehker published a study arguing that term limits create accountability problems for U.S. governors. This followed the 2016 examination by political scientist Philip Potter of the behavior of U.S. presidents in their final terms; he concluded that they were more ambitious than during their first terms, particularly in foreign policy. As Trump becomes a “lame duck,” his support is weakening and Republicans are becoming less afraid of him. Yet he still retains enormous power that he can exercise more or less unilaterally.

With no need to campaign for reelection, Trump may even feel free to ignore public opinion. At the height of his trade war with the wider world, he argued that American children would now have “two dolls instead of 30,” implying that voters had become accustomed to living far beyond their means. Trump was even more explicit when the war with Iran sent gasoline prices soaring and accelerated inflation: he called it “a small price” to pay for security.

With no need to campaign for reelection, Trump may ignore public opinion

A second presidential term creates an inherent imbalance: a president’s incentive to negotiate with Congress and remain responsive to voters can disappear before his ability to act unilaterally does. Trump appears to sense this. In their recently published book, Regime Change, journalists Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan write that the president has grown less interested in the backlash to his policies. According to Swan, Trump “doesn’t care at all” about the outcome of the midterm elections. Instead, he is focused on his legacy as a historical figure.

Whatever the outcome of the November elections, Trump will enter 2027 at the peak of his presidential power, with little incentive to seek compromise with either allies or opponents. Against a backdrop of economic troubles, an unpopular war with Iran, mass deportations, and new ideological battles at home, political tensions may only intensify.

Trump’s critics have often optimistically suggested that he had reached the limits of his reckless and dangerous behavior. Yet his political career has repeatedly demonstrated otherwise: Trump can still keep raising the stakes, turning his unpredictability into an ever greater threat for the country's stability.

This growth has fueled a global wave of anti-immigration sentiment. Yet even politicians who come to power on the back of such rhetoric usually fail to stop the influx of migrants. Donald Trump, for example, only slightly reduced the number of legal migrants entering the United States during his first term, largely by cutting the number of refugees admitted through the UN resettlement program. And during Giorgia Meloni's tenure as Italy's prime minister, the number of migrants arriving in the country has only increased — Italy has even remained the leading destination for people entering Europe illegally.

Brexit, which took place against a backdrop of British discontent over migration, led European citizens to leave the country, but they were replaced by far more migrants from non-European countries. Russian authorities, meanwhile, are fueling anti-immigration hysteria while trying to replace laborers from post-Soviet countries with different migrants from farther afield.

Migration, of course, has an objective driver: growing demand for labor. And as long as that demand persists, migration will continue to grow. According to forecasts by the International Organization for Migration, the number of migrants worldwide will exceed 400 million by 2050. It is therefore essential to understand how best to manage migration while integrating newcomers.

By 2050, the number of migrants worldwide will exceed 400 million

As with measures aimed at restricting entry, attempts to integrate migrants often produce outcomes that run counter to the aims of government efforts.

Sweden, for example, is the world's most migrant-friendly country and has the highest score on the Migrant Integration Policy Index (MIPEX). Yet migrants in Sweden are still more likely to commit crimes than the native-born population; they earn less, pay less in taxes, and their children perform worse at school. 

In Spain, by contrast, migrants account for a similar share of the population — just over 20% — while both the MIPEX score and spending on integration programs are lower. Yet the gap between migrants and the native population is also smaller across all indicators. Moreover, migration has reduced unemployment and crime in the country and boosted GDP per capita.

In Russia, meanwhile, a country that is extremely unwelcoming to newcomers and has a very low MIPEX score, migrants commit crimes significantly less often than the native population while having the same employment rate.

Research shows that three factors matter more than either spending on integration or the strictness of migration policy itself: migrants' access to the labor market, the composition of migration flows, and the ability of institutions to prevent discrimination against newcomers.

Access to the labor market

Employment is the main factor determining an individual's propensity to commit crime across all population groups. Unemployed people are more likely to turn to crime to survive — subsistence crimes, which typically include theft, squatting, or even prostitution. They are also more likely to become involved in criminal networks, which essentially serve as alternative forms of employment.

Even among employed people, peaks in criminal activity occur during periods when they are not working — namely, on holidays, when the rate of violent crime tends to increase, largely because of alcohol. Among unemployed people, by contrast, holidays have a much smaller effect on crime.

Around 60% of migrants worldwide moved in search of work. Since labor migrants generally have lower crime rates than the local population as a whole, an influx of labor migrants can even reduce the overall per-capita crime rate.

Crime rates among labor migrants are generally lower than among the local population

This largely explains the paradoxically low crime rate among migrants in Russia. The country accepts virtually no refugees, and the overwhelming majority of newcomers are labor migrants. Since 2014, Ukrainian refugees — following Russia's occupation of Crimea and parts of Ukraine's Donetsk and Luhansk regions — have been granted preferential residency arrangements allowing them to work immediately, access government services, and remain in the country indefinitely. They were also eligible for a simplified path to citizenship (meaning they have barely registered in official crime statistics as migrants).

There is considerable evidence that allowing migrants to work legally also improves their integration. A revealing comparison of two waves of immigration to Britain illustrates the point. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the country received asylum seekers who were mostly not allowed to work immediately, leading to an increase in property crime. By contrast, the wave of migration that followed the accession of 10 new countries to the EU consisted of people who immediately gained the right to work and, in turn, slightly reduced crime rates.

A similar situation emerged in Italy after Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU. Because citizens of those countries automatically acquired legal status, the incidence of “subsistence crimes” among them fell by half. The effect was particularly pronounced in the country's industrialized northern regions, while in the south, where migrants were often already working informally in agriculture, legalization had virtually no effect on crime rates.

The same pattern can be seen in the contrast between English-speaking countries — the UK, Canada, the U.S., Australia, Ireland, and New Zealand — and continental Europe. This is partly because the English-speaking countries are geographically distant from major conflict zones, making it more difficult for refugees to reach them unless they are resettled through the UN Refugee Agency's programs.

As a result, these people have already had their asylum claims approved and are granted the right to work immediately upon arrival. Consequently, in all these countries, the share of migrants among the prison population is lower than their share of the total population, while their children perform better on standardized tests than children of native-born residents.

In continental Europe, by contrast, refugees arrive directly across land borders or by sea, meaning they do not immediately gain the right to work. A report by the European Council on Refugees and Exiles notes that, although numerous European directives recognize the right to work as a fundamental human right and call for asylum seekers to be granted access to the labor market as soon as possible, many countries still impose various barriers until their applications are processed.

In some countries, refugees are housed for long periods in camps located in areas with high unemployment or are frequently transferred between accommodation centers, making it difficult to secure permanent employment. Elsewhere, authorities delay the issuance of documents, while employers themselves may be unsure whether they are allowed to hire asylum seekers whose applications have not yet been approved.

In many EU countries, migrants are allowed to work only in a limited range of sectors, mostly in low-skilled jobs. At the same time, many higher-skilled positions require a relevant degree and a certain level of proficiency in the local language, and their professional qualifications obtained abroad may not be recognized. As a result, for example, low-skilled migrants in Italy have a higher employment rate than Italians with a similar level of qualifications (65.0% versus 53.2%), while highly skilled migrants have a lower employment rate (69.0% versus 85.7%).

In Hungary, temporary residence permits are issued for just three months, meaning refugees must repeatedly have their documents verified at their place of work, increasing employers' administrative costs. In Greece, only 3% of refugees have managed to open bank accounts into which they can receive their salaries. In the Netherlands, of the 26,520 people who applied for asylum in 2021, only 590 were granted the right to work.

In eight EU countries, migrants from non-EU states have a higher employment rate than the native population: the Czech Republic, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg Malta, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia. Among these, Poland and the Czech Republic receive large numbers of Ukrainians who benefit from simplified work-permit procedures, while Portugal has an analagous arrangement for people from its former colonies. 

In the United States, migrants have traditionally had lower crime rates, better health outcomes, and higher levels of academic achievement than native-born Americans, while by the third generation they tended to converge with — or even surpass — them on economic indicators. Even refugees had employment rates comparable to those of labor migrants.

However, in the 2010s, a surge of asylum seekers began crossing the U.S. border from four primary countries: Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Venezuela. This influx was largely a legacy of U.S. intervention in these countries' politics during the Cold War, exacerbated by the flow of weapons into Latin America from the United States itself. Because these asylum seekers arrived in the U.S. directly rather than through the UN resettlement program, they were barred from working until their asylum claims were approved. Unsurprisingly, their integration outcomes were worse than for previous waves of newcomers, forcing the government to spend considerably more money to support them.

Restricting asylum seekers' right to work therefore has long-term negative economic effects. Until the restriction is lifted, refugees are forced to rely entirely on government support, thus becoming dependent on benefits. During this period, they remain disconnected from society because they are excluded from economic life, while their professional skills gradually deteriorate. As a result, their chances of finding employment after receiving work authorization fall by 15%.

Restricting asylum seekers' right to work has long-term negative economic effects

The phenomenon is not American in nature. In Germany, a court ruling reduced the length of time refugees had to wait for work authorization. This experience showed that people who had to wait an additional seven months for permission to work were 20 percentage points less likely to find employment than those who obtained the right earlier. The gap only disappeared ten years later, and researchers estimate that the EU lost €37.6 billion in GDP because refugees who arrived during the migration crisis triggered by the war in Syria faced restrictions on employment.

Which migrants arrive

In Sweden, refugees can work almost immediately after applying for asylum, although only in low-skilled jobs. Nevertheless, the country's integration outcomes are among the worst of any developed country.

A major factor is the composition of the migration flows arriving in Sweden. For decades, the country has accepted large numbers of refugees, most of them from the culturally distant Muslim world. The three main countries of origin for migrants in Sweden are Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Sweden is now the European country with the highest number of refugees per capita.

Refugees, however, are the category of migrant that is hardest to integrate. Unlike economic migrants, who typically choose their destination in advance, prepare for the move, learn the language, and often already have useful contacts, in-demand skills, or a job offer, refugees are forced to leave their homes. They often lose their property, documents, professional networks, and the ability to make use of the human capital they have accumulated. They adapt much more slowly than labor migrants and people who move for family reunification, resulting in what researchers refer to as the “refugee gap.”

Refugees are the category of migrants that is hardest to integrate

While labor migrants move based on their skills and the needs of the labor market that attracts them, refugees go wherever they can find safety. Their integration is further complicated by the trauma they have experienced, prolonged uncertainty over their legal status, restrictions on access to the labor market while their applications are being processed, and administrative policies that place them in areas with limited economic opportunities and little or no diaspora support.

In Spain, the flow of humanitarian migrants today is comparable to that seen in Sweden at the peak of its refugee intake (although its relative size is significantly smaller given that Spain's population is five times as big). At the same time, 47% of migrants in Spain come from Latin America, with which Spain shares a language and similar culture. They can enter without a visa, are immediately allowed to work, and can apply for citizenship after just two years of residence. Another 27% come from other European countries, while only 18% come from Africa and 6% from Asia (including the Philippines, which was also once a Spanish colony). In short, historical, cultural, and linguistic ties make integration into Spanish society considerably easier for most migrants than the integration of Middle Eastern migrants in Sweden, despite the lower level of government spending.

Russia likewise has significant cultural and linguistic influence in Central Asia, as well as large diasporas from the region, making it easier for migrants from Central Asian countries to integrate into Russian society. Similarly, the U.S. has exerted influence across Latin America for centuries and is home to large Latin American diasporas. Poland and the Czech Republic have also achieved strong migrant integration outcomes because, historically, they have primarily received Ukrainians, who are culturally and linguistically similar and can take up employment immediately. Thus, even when a large influx of Ukrainian refugees arrived after the outbreak of the war, they were relatively easily integrated.

Cultural differences, however, do not account for the entire gap. The quality of the human capital that countries attract also matters. The U.S., for example, is geographically distant from most of the world's main migration routes, so reaching the country itself requires substantial resources. Its high wages consequently attract some of the most successful and highly educated migrants.

For example, Middle Eastern migrants in the U.S. are twice as likely as Americans overall to hold a bachelor's degree, and they earn slightly more. In Europe, by contrast, where many arrived as low-skilled guest workers, undocumented migrants, or refugees, they are among the most disadvantaged groups, with low incomes and high crime rates.

Similarly, Pakistani migrants in the U.S. have higher incomes and higher levels of education than the native-born population, while in Britain they have one of the lowest employment rates in the country. The colonial legacy plays a role: in the 1950s and 1960s, Britain itself brought in large numbers of workers from Pakistan to work in factories, and they later brought their families over.

A substantial part of the employment gap, however, is also explained by the fact that many Pakistani women, due to cultural traditions and discrimination, choose not to work and instead engage in unpaid domestic work, a common practice among diasporas from Muslim-majority countries across Europe.

The impact of discrimination

Finally, it also matters how prepared a country's institutions are to receive migrants. Even if a country attracts relatively well-off migrant groups and provides them with rapid access to the labor market, that alone is not enough. What matters is whether institutions allow migrants to compete with native-born residents on an equal footing.

The U.S., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand are countries built by migrants. They have accumulated experience with immigration and established diasporas that help newcomers integrate. European countries, by contrast, only became countries of immigration in the 20th century, having previously been countries of emigration. They are considerably more ethnically homogeneous and therefore have less experience and few longstanding institutions for integrating migrants.

A meta-analysis of 97 experiments examining hiring discrimination across nine developed countries — the U.S., Canada, France, Belgium, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden — found that the highest levels of discrimination in the initial screening of résumés were recorded in France and Sweden, while the lowest were found in Germany, Norway, and the U.S. In Sweden and France, the groups facing the highest levels of discrimination were also those that make up a significant share of the migrant population: Black people and people from the Middle East.

France and Sweden have the highest levels of discrimination in screening résumés from applicants with “migrant” names

The poor results of Sweden's integration policy can therefore also be attributed to informal practices, such as screening out candidates with foreign-sounding names at the résumé stage. Even when the state is highly willing to fund social programs, migrants can face serious barriers as early as the search for their first job. And this is only one form of discrimination. The study's authors note that Germany has managed to build a system that limits bias in hiring, while discrimination remains widespread in the housing market.

Promoting formal integration also has a positive effect on other aspects of integration. The experience of Switzerland, where naturalization applications in some municipalities were decided by referendum, showed that immigrants who won their vote and obtained citizenship earned an average of $5,000 more per year over the following 15 years than otherwise similar immigrants who failed to gain similar support. The effect was particularly strong among the most marginalized groups — people from Turkey and the former Yugoslavia, as well as low-wage workers.

Thus, institutions that not only give migrants access to the labor market but also recognize them as equal members of the political community can generate long-term economic benefits and improve the prospects for successful integration.

The Institute for Agricultural Market Studies (IKAR) also expects a significant drop in shipments in September but has not yet given a specific forecast, the business outlet Kommersant writes. In August, according to Sovecon estimates, Russia exported around 2 million metric tons of wheat — 55.6% less than a year earlier and 60% below the five-year average.

Exports began falling sharply in the second half of July after Ukrainian drones damaged terminals in the Sea of Azov and Black Sea, causing them to shut down. In early August, Russian grain was being shipped from only eight ports, compared with 29 a year earlier. Exporters have increasingly turned to rail routes and ports in the Baltic while also increasing shipments to Kazakhstan, other Central Asian countries, and Azerbaijan.

Still, with a significant share of the harvest stuck inside Russia, domestic grain prices are falling. As of Aug. 30, Class 5 wheat cost an average of 7,400 rubles per ton — down 42% year-on-year. Class 4 wheat fell 41.1% over the same period, to 8,300 rubles per ton. Meanwhile, the cost of growing wheat at one of the farms surveyed by Kommersant is estimated at approximately 12,000 rubles per ton.

On Aug. 28, authorities in the Rostov Region declared a state of emergency due to the shutdown of ports and the buildup of grain among producers. The Azov-Black Sea basin previously handled 80–90% of Russian grain exports, and after shipping was halted on the Azov-Don Sea Canal and the terminals in Novorossiysk and Taman were damaged, it proved impossible to redirect comparable volumes through other Russian ports.

Sovecon director Andrei Sizov believes that, barring new major attacks on port infrastructure, the situation will soon improve. Shipments, he says, could begin to recover as alternative routes develop. If prices remain low, however, agricultural producers warn that planted areas could be reduced next year.

The Admiral Nakhimov is one of four heavy nuclear-powered missile cruisers of the Soviet-era Project 1144 Orlan class. The ship entered service in 1988 under the name Kalinin, and its last voyage before going in for repairs took place in July 1997. Since then, the cruiser has spent nearly three decades of inactivity while undergoing repair and modernization. Prior to that, the most notable episode of its service was a six-month deployment to the Mediterranean Sea in 1991. Although the Admiral Nakhimov was officially placed at the Sevmash shipbuilding enterprise in 1999, its large-scale modernization did not actually begin until 2013.

In June 2026, the Admiral Nakhimov was put to sea for the first time in 28 years in order to undergo final sea trials. Russian Navy head Alexander Moiseyev stated that the ship is expected to return to the fleet before the end of the year.

During its modernization process, the cruiser was almost entirely rearmed, according to Russian state propaganda outlets. Instead of 20 P-700 Granit anti-ship missiles, it received 80 universal launch cells for Kalibr cruise missiles, Oniks anti-ship missiles, and Zircon hypersonic missiles. Russian media also claim that the ship has been fitted with 96 cells for anti-aircraft missiles. As a result, once back in service the Admiral Nakhimov will be one of the most heavily armed surface ships in the Russian fleet.

The cost of the years-long modernization has not been officially disclosed. However, in 2023, TASS cited a figure of over 200 billion rubles ($2.3 billion).

The rationale behind such a lengthy and costly modernization of a single Soviet-era ship has raised questions among military observers. Over the course of the work, Russia directed scarce shipyard capacity, skilled specialists, and other resources toward restoring a single hull.

Another open question involves the vulnerability of large and expensive ships in modern warfare. Given Ukraine’s use of relatively cheap anti-ship missiles and sea drones, the sinking of such a cruiser would imply the loss of a large amount of weaponry concentrated on a single platform.

The incident in question occurred on May 7, three days after The Insider published a detailed account by Miftakhov of the torture regime at Polar Owl. The political prisoner said that Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) staff and inmates beat him on the heels with a wooden mallet, tortured him with electric shocks, strangled him, and threatened him with sexual violence. Miftakhov also named the alleged participants in the torture, and The Insider was able to identify them.

According to Kravtsova’s lawsuit, on the indicated date she visited Miftakhov as his lawyer. During their confidential meeting, she passed along questions from Miftakhov’s wife, Elena Gorban, who is also one of his defense lawyers but was nevertheless denied visitation. Miftakhov wrote out answers and gave them to Kravtsova. As she was leaving the colony, an “entire squad” of staff stopped her. The officer on duty, I. I. Prishchepov, forcibly took the folder of documents from her and “leafed through and reread every page,” after which he confiscated Miftakhov’s writings along with several pages of Kravtsova’s personal notes.

Kravtsova returned to Polar Owl on May 12, and according to the warning issued on that date, the confiscated items included a handwritten letter and a copy of a sports newspaper with the handwritten names and positions of Penal Colony No. 18 staff, as well as the names of inmates.

The colony administration claimed the lawyer had committed a violation by “bypassing the administration” in her attempt to deliver Miftakhov’s correspondence to his wife. According to the document, these actions “indicate antisocial behavior.” Kravtsova disagreed with the warning, arguing that the law allows a convicted person to enjoy confidential communication with a lawyer and does not require documents received by the lawyer to be handed over to the colony administration.

According to her lawsuit, Kravtsova was later required to sign an acknowledgment of Article 15 of the Penal Code before every visit to inmates. The lawyer writes that she continues to sign it because otherwise a dispute with staff could delay access to her clients. She is asking the court to declare both the warning and this practice unlawful, and to order the colony to return the confiscated letter and newspaper containing Miftakho’s notes.

The Labytnangi City Court will begin hearing the case on Sept. 15. The court has summoned Miftakhov himself, his wife Elena Gorban, and the FSIN department for the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug as interested parties.

Violations of the confidentiality of Miftakhov’s communication with his defense had been reported before. In late May, another of Miftakhov’s lawyers, Svetlana Sidorkina, who had traveled to Yamal from Moscow, reported that FSIN staff had reviewed the contents of documents requiring Miftakhov’s signature before permitting them to be handed over to the inmate.

According to Likhachev, delivering fuel to the plant is dangerous due to shelling by the Ukrainian army. As state-owned news agency RIA Novosti reports:

“The ongoing shelling of access roads makes any of our attempts to deliver fuel for the backup diesel generators extremely dangerous. Supplying the plant with diesel fuel is our top priority. And we will organize the delivery operation under any circumstances.”

Rosatom’s press service had previously reported that on Aug. 20, external power supply to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant was cut off after the Ferosplavna-1 line was damaged, adding that the damaged section is located in territory controlled by Ukraine. “In addition to measures aimed at resolving the problem with our own power supply, we are actively working with the Ministry of Defense, the National Guard, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to secure another temporary ceasefire as soon as possible, which is needed to repair the Ferosplavna line,” Likhachev said.

The IAEA confirms that the Zaporizhzhia NPP has lost its external power supply. On Aug. 29, the agency’s Director General, Rafael Grossi, said that the plant has been without off-site power for more than a week and is using backup diesel generators to supply the electricity needed for nuclear safety. Grossi stressed the importance of ensuring the plant has an adequate supply of diesel fuel.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) do indeed shell roads in the occupied territories, and fuel supplies to the Russian army are among the targets. Ukrainian military officials have repeatedly stated that Russia disguises military cargo as civilian goods in an effort to protect it from drone strikes.

On Aug. 27, sources interviewed by Fontanka and the independent outlet Agentstvo reported that Traber had been released from pretrial detention. According to those reports, an investigator had issued a ruling to release Traber from custody because of a sharp deterioration in his health. Fontanka writes that since Aug. 29, Traber has been holding “a series of meetings with government and business figures in Moscow and St. Petersburg.”

Ilya Traber was detained in mid-June after being named as the person who ordered the murder of Vyborg City Council deputy and crime boss Alexander Petrov, who was shot dead in the Vyborg area in 2020. Also arrested along with Traber were his business partner Vladimir Danilenko, former professional boxer Alisultan Nadirbegov, and Said Saladinov. Investigators consider Nadirbegov and Saladinov to be the perpetrators of the murder.

After his arrest, Traber began transferring the stakes he held in various companies.

As The Insider reported earlier, Traber was part of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle and even attended his birthday celebrations. More about the ties between Putin and Traber can be found in the following articles:

• Putin's 4 percent: How criminal kingpins with Kremlin connections launder oil money in Monaco
• “He used to work for them”: What wiretapped calls of the Tambovskaya gang reveal about Putin's role in the Russian mafia
• “If I destroy the prosecutor, I'll do good for my country”: How Ilya Traber and his sidekicks from the Tambov Gang launder their past

This past spring, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and the Prosecutor General’s Office notified Neelov in absentia that he was suspected of committing war crimes. In July, he was placed under European Union sanctions for violations of the rights of Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilians. The EU Council states that Neelov was involved in torture, beatings, and the humiliation of prisoners at the Olenivka penal colony, which is also located in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine.

On the night of July 28–29, 2022, an explosion at the penal colony occurred in one of the barracks where Ukrainian prisoners of war were being held. More than 50 people were killed, and more than 100 more were wounded. Russian authorities claimed that Ukraine had struck the colony using an American HIMARS rocket system. However, experts who examined video footage, photographs, and satellite imagery ruled out the HIMARS strike theory. In 2025, Ukrainian ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets, citing an internal analysis by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, reported that the strike had been carried out from Russian-controlled territory using thermobaric weapons.

The industrial zone of the colony — the section where the prisoners died — had previously been almost empty. According to former Olenivka detainee Vitaly Sitnikov, captured Azov fighters were transferred there from ordinary barracks only about two days before the explosion. Sitnikov also spoke of systematic beatings of prisoners and the presence of Russian troops and special forces on the colony grounds.

This is not the first time a car belonging to the head of the Olenivka penal colony has been blown up in Donetsk. In December 2024, former colony head Sergei Yevsyukov was killed when his Toyota Land Cruiser exploded. His wife, who was also in the car, was severely injured. According to preliminary findings, an explosive device with a yield of about 100 grams of TNT equivalent had been placed under the vehicle. A few days later, Russia’s Federal Security Service reported the detention of a Donetsk resident, who was accused of organizing the bombing on the orders of Ukrainian military intelligence. The Russian security service claimed that the suspect had been promised $10,000 for the killing.

GCAW1984 describes itself as an international anti-war movement unaffiliated with any state and opposed to militarization regardless of the country involved. The group has called companies producing weapons for conflict zones “legitimate targets” and threatened further acts of sabotage. It has also hinted at a possible future attack on a U.S.-Israeli missile production plant that is planned to be opened in Germany.

The first sign that Russian is the native language of GCAW1984 was found on the group’s Instagram account, which is run in English but but features two saved story collections with the same Russian name (“Актуальное”). The Insider checked them with Instagram’s interface set to English, and the label remained in Russian, meaning that the word “Актуальное” was entered in Russian by whoever managed the account.

Several more traces have survived in the website’s source code. The site was created using Hostinger AI Builder, and the page code contains the generator: Hostinger AI Builder tag. The code suggests that a ready-made template was used to create the site and was not fully customized for GCAW1984. Its configuration still contains the template name “bulletin.”

An unusual detail emerged in the formatting of the site’s text. The page’s main font is Poppins, but within a quote from George Orwell’s novel 1984, a small fragment retains different formatting: font-family: "YS Text", -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Arial, Helvetica, "Arial Unicode MS", sans-serif.

YS Text is the proprietary font of Russian internet search giant Yandex. Since the font is not used elsewhere in GCAW1984’s website design and appears only within a separate fragment of text, it may have been carried into the editor along with formatting copied from another source.

Notably, the quote from Orwell itself points to a possible Russian-language source. Although 1984 was written in English, GCAW1984 does not use the original English wording.

Orwell’s sentence reads as the author actually wrote it reads:

Being in a minority, even a minority of one, did not make you mad.

On the GCAW1984 website, however, a re-translated version appears:

Just because you're in the minority, or even in the singular, doesn't mean you're crazy.

The wording “even in the singular” sounds unnatural when applied to a person in English. It does, however, correspond quite literally to a common Russian translation of the same sentence:

«Если ты в меньшинстве — и даже в единственном числе, — это не значит, что ты безумен».

This is, for example, the version published in Russian by the Quotes of Famous People portal, Eksmo, and Russian-language digital libraries.

The authors of GCAW1984, quoting an English-language novel on an English-language website, apparently did not use the original English text but instead translated its Russian version back into English.

The Insider previously analyzed the GCAW1984 manifesto and a letter received by the editorial office from a person identifying himself as Robert Lewanowski. An AI analysis of both texts also identified numerous constructions characteristic of translation from Russian. A native English speaker shown the manifesto by The Insider suggested that its author was a native speaker of an Eastern European or Slavic language.

There are discrepancies in the biographies of the organization’s members published on the website as well, as the Slovak outlet Aktuality.sk noted. The “Team” section lists just two people — Polish national Robert Lewanowski and Serbian national Stefan Ilić. Lewanowski, for example, is said to have been drafted into the Polish army in 2007 and served for two years, even though compulsory military service in Poland at the time lasted nine months.

The website’s authors also claim that he studied at Poland’s National Defence Academy and took part in humanitarian missions in Iraq, Yemen, Syria, Somalia, and South Sudan. However, The Insider was unable to find independent evidence corroborating such activities. The website explains this by saying that Lewanowski deliberately “tries not to publicize his activities” and prefers to “remain in the shadows.”

Ilić’s biography is described in similarly elaborate detail. According to the website, he was born in Niš and lost his mother when the city was bombed by NATO forces in 1999. Ilić is said to have received medical training, and from 2011 he purportedly worked in Syria and other Middle Eastern countries “as part of a UN humanitarian mission.” He then allegedly worked as an anesthesiologist at a major hospital in Germany while simultaneously studying political science at the Free University of Berlin. In late 2025, he was supposedly fired for taking part in protests against increased military spending and “NATO’s aggressive eastward expansion policy,” after which he returned to Serbia due to unnamed threats. The Insider has so far found no independent confirmation of this biography either.

Interestingly, both Lewanowski and Ilić are named after footballers — one Polish and one Serbian. The Polish footballer’s surname, however, was slightly altered, as the unknown “pacifists” removed the letter “d” from Lewandowski.

According to an assessment by S&P Global, drone strikes knocked at least 26 Russian oil refineries out of operation between January and July, seven of which have yet to resume operations. Four more refineries were hit in August, and in an attempt to keep the domestic market supplied, the Russian government extended its ban on gasoline exports for another six months (to Jan. 31, 2027), with the ban on diesel exports getting an extension only until the end of September.

The drone strikes twice

The collapse in supply is being driven by a record-large new wave of Ukrainian strikes on Russia's largest refineries. On July 25, a drone damaged the Tyumen refinery. On July 29, a drone hit Lukoil-Permnefteorgsintez, causing a fire at one of its processing units. On August 1, a refinery in Ufa was hit. According to the Financial Times, by that point Ukrainian attacks had already knocked out nearly a third of Russia’s refining capacity.

Lukoil-Permnefteorgsintez was subsequently attacked again. In addition, drone debris caused a fire in the tank farm of Slavneft-YANOS in Yaroslavl, a refinery that has been attacked six times since the beginning of the year. On Aug. 8, the Ilsky and Syzran refineries caught fire.

On Aug. 10, a strike on the Nizhnekamsk industrial zone, which reportedly affected Nizhnekamskneftekhim, left nearly 100 people dead or injured. That same day, the country’s largest complex for the fractionation and processing of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) in Tobolsk shut down for an indefinite period.

On Aug. 13, drones set fire to the refinery in Salavat. Two days earlier, Orsknefteorgsintez in the Orenburg region had completely halted refining after a strike damaged critical equipment, apparently imported. Under the worst-case scenario, repairs there could take up to six months.

According to figures compiled by the DeepStrike project, at least 43 infrastructure facilities were hit across Russia in the first two weeks of August alone, a record since the start of the full-scale war. Some estimates put the number of Ukrainian long-range drones launched during this period at around 350 a day — more than 5,000 over the course of two weeks.

The shift in tactics was described in detail by the Financial Times. Ukrainian military planners and drone operators told the newspaper that Kyiv is now targeting the components that are hardest and most expensive to replace: primary refining units, catalyst units, and compressor equipment. The aim is to keep refineries out of operation for as long as possible and make each strike as costly as possible for Moscow.

The aim is to keep refineries offline for as long as possible and make every strike as costly for Moscow as possible

It was in this context that on July 10 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced the creation of a new Ukrainian Armed Forces unit to plan and carry out long-range strikes against targets in Russia. Then, on July 26, he put out an updated list of priority targets.

While attacks on Russia’s oil refining industry were sporadic last summer, by August 2026 Ukraine had shifted to a systematic campaign, designed to prevent targeted refineries from establishing a stable repair cycle by making each restored unit a repeat target before production has time to return to normal.

Repairs are falling behind

The pace at which Russia is bringing damaged capacity back online is increasingly lagging behind the rate of new strikes. According to a Kpler estimate, Russian refineries will process 4 million barrels of oil per day in August, down 5% from July and 2.5% from June, which was already the lowest level in years.

Industry sources do not rule out the possibility that actual refining volumes will be even lower, at 3.8–4.1 million barrels per day. Refining could rise to 4–4.3 million barrels per day in September, but the industry will no longer be able to return to Russia’s normal level of 5.3–5.5 million barrels per day for the foreseeable future.

The reason repairs are falling behind is not a lack of willingness or money on the part of oil companies, but the nature of the damage and their dependence on imported components. Minor damage of the sort caused at the Omsk refinery or Lukoil’s Permnefteorgsintez can be repaired within weeks. However, at facilities where primary refining units or catalyst units have been knocked out, repairs take months. At the Orsk refinery, for example, the equipment is imported, making repairs an even lengthier process, as under sanctions getting the necessary components into Russia is far from straightforward. Some parts are now being routed through China, but even then, much depends on logistics and compatibility.

The reason repairs are falling behind is the nature of the damage and dependence on imported components

Fuel availability on the domestic market reflects these swings. The acute phase of the shortage in late May and early July, when queues formed and sales limits were introduced across dozens of regions, began to ease by the end of the month. Kemerovo, Vologda, Omsk were among the regions to lift their restrictions. 

But the crisis returned in early August, leading the Kaluga and Lipetsk regions to reintroduce odd-even fuel sales, while the Orenburg region introduced the system for the first time following the shutdown of the Orsk refinery. Sevastopol also reinstated QR codes for fuel purchases. According to Izvestia, by mid-August fuel was available at fewer than one-third of the country’s gas stations. Still, the situation with diesel is considerably less acute: production capacity is twice as high, while the gap between normal consumption and output is smaller.

The autumn season risks bringing another wave of problems. According to Kommersant, maintenance is scheduled for several major refineries, and some experts are already questioning earlier forecasts that the situation would stabilize by September or October. Now they point to the fact that the technological and logistical consequences of the strikes are more prolonged than appearances — such as queues disappearing — might suggest.

Three scenarios for the autumn

Estimates of the share of Russia’s refining capacity that is currently out of commission vary depending on the methodology used. In early July, the Ukrainian General Staff put the figure at 42.74%. At the end of July, the Financial Times estimated that 45% of capacity was nominally offline, while more than 30% was actually idle. Actual refining volumes, meanwhile, had fallen to about 25–30% below normal levels, and Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP) President Alexander Shokhin recently put the losses at 25–30%. Whether the share of knocked-out capacity reaches 50% or more will depend on which of the three scenarios outlined below develops between now and the end of the year.

Scenario one: escalation

Ukraine maintains or increases the current pace and effectiveness of targeted strikes on hard-to-replace components, while Russia continues to struggle with sanctions that restrict imports of equipment and catalysts. In this scenario, the nominal share of capacity knocked out could approach 50% — or even exceed it —  as early as this autumn. Scheduled maintenance in September would only compound the problem by coinciding with the seasonal peak in demand.

In this scenario, the shortage would worsen, but its impact would be uneven. The hardest-hit regions would be those dependent on a single nearby refinery or a vulnerable supply route, such as the Orenburg and Volgograd regions. Meanwhile, larger cities with diversified supplies would suffer less, even if restrictions on fuel purchases at gas stations would become almost universal.

Formally, the military and security services would remain the priority for fuel supplies. On June 23, Vladimir Putin said that the strikes would not affect the situation at the front. A month later, however, volunteers reported shortages of several hundred liters of gasoline for some units. Further escalation could lead to more such cases.

The government is unlikely to allow fuel prices to be determined freely by the market. Based on the experience of 2018, a renewed informal agreement with oil companies to freeze retail prices in exchange for budget subsidies is far more likely. Those subsidies are already costing the treasury hundreds of billions of rubles a month.

The closest historical parallel is the 1973 oil crisis in the West. Authorities in several countries issued fuel rationing cards in anticipation of shortages, although actual rationing never materialized. The United States introduced an odd-even system, while the Netherlands banned private car travel on Sundays. The restrictions lasted about six months and ended after oil exporters reached a political decision to lift the embargo.

Because Russia’s current crisis is driven by war rather than market forces, resolving it quickly would require an end to the strikes themselves. For now, Putin’s public assertion that there have been no “critical consequences” — despite the loss of a third of the country’s refining capacity — suggests that he not preparing to make concessions when it comes to the war.

Scenario two: a plateau with partial adaptation

Under this scenario, the strikes continue at roughly their current level, but Russia gradually builds alternative supply chains for equipment through China and other Asian countries, increases toll refining at Kazakh refineries, and expands imports of finished fuel.

Nominally idled capacity would stabilize at 30–40%, with acute shortages occurring locally after each major strike, but without the panic seen previously.

Fuel imports and negotiations with Kazakhstan can be scaled up within weeks, whereas establishing reliable alternative supply chains for catalysts and equipment for primary refining units would take years. By the end of 2026 Russia could close only part of this gap at best. The “plateau,” therefore, would not mean recovery, but stabilization at a lower level.

Another question is why the refineries are not better protected in the first place. Effective air defense and electronic warfare systems remain scarce military resources, meaning Russia simply does not have the capacity to protect all such facilities simultaneously. Moreover, the oil refining industry, even at state-owned companies, is formally part of the commercial sector, which the government is not obliged to protect as heavily as its military infrastructure. The Moscow Refinery, for example, is located in the country’s most heavily defended air defense zone, yet it still suffered critical damage.

Economic fatigue is another issue that deserves attention. Repairing a single complex unit at a refinery the size of those in Ryazan or Tyumen could cost in the range of $50–100 million, while total payments to oil companies through the fuel-price damper mechanism and subsidies have already exceeded 1.2 trillion rubles ($14 billion) since the crisis began. Some refineries (like the one in Novoshakhtinsk) have also publicly complained about mounting debts to contractors and delayed wage payments following a series of Ukrainian strikes.

In other words, both the government and individual companies could run out of money before the Ukrainian campaign comes to an end.

Scenario three: de-escalation

If Ukraine reduces the intensity of its strikes on oil refineries for political or military reasons, or if it shifts its focus to other targets while damaged refineries are able to complete repairs, some Russian regions could return to pre-crisis conditions at gas stations by November. Even so, according to most estimates, overall refining volumes would remain 10–15% below 2020–2024 levels. This residual shortfall represents irreversible losses that are highly unlikely to be recovered by the end of the year, even if the strikes cease altogether.

The Moscow Refinery offers the clearest example. Both of its primary refining units were knocked out in June, and according to an estimate by Sinara Investment Bank, repairs could take up to a year and cost $1 billion. Reports circulated on social media that the refinery had resumed processing two weeks after the attack, b—ut the report appears to have been false — there has been no official confirmation, and there has been no corresponding improvement in the situation at Moscow gas stations. The refinery is not expected to resume operations before 2027.

Likely irreversible losses also include units dependent on sanctioned catalysts and other technologies licensed by Western companies. Efforts to replace them with Russian or Chinese alternatives by the end of the year is similarly unlikely, even if no further strikes are carried out against these facilities.

And so, even under the most favorable scenario for Moscow, refining will not return to the pre-crisis level of 5.3–5.5 million barrels per day. At best, the energy industry will settle at a new, lower level of refining that becomes its baseline for years to come. For now, the second scenario appears the most likely, but Ukraine’s focus on hard-to-replace components makes the even more pessemistic first scenario considerably more plausible than it would seemed just a month ago.

Has oil, imports gasoline

Foreign fuel shipments to Russia are already underway, but they are not yet large enough to make a decisive difference. The main supplier is Belarus, sendingh 141,000 metric tons of gasoline to Russia in June — a record high and 2.4 times the May volume. This was largely the result of redirecting some Belarusian exports that previously went to Central Asia to the Russian market instead. At the same time, transit shipments of Belarusian gasoline through Russia to third countries plunged from 166,000 metric tons in May to 24,000 metric tons in June. According to an estimate by experts at the Institute of Energy and Finance, the realistic ceiling for Belarusian supplies is no more than 200,000 metric tons a month — equivalent to just two days of summer gasoline consumption in Russia.

The ceiling for Belarusian supplies is no more than 200,000 metric tons a month — equivalent to no more than two days of summer gasoline consumption in Russia

India joined the effort later. The first shipment from the subcontinent, 42,000 metric tons, arrived on Aug. 5 from Nayara Energy, which is partly owned by Rosneft. Overall, India, Turkey, and to a lesser extent China, are expected to supply another 200,000 metric tons a month.

Since early August, Russia has also begun purchasing petroleum products at the South Korean port of Ulsan. Meanwhile, a shipment of gasoline loaded at Tangier, Morocco — reportedly supplied by Lukoil — has been sitting idle in Murmansk for a third week because of a dispute over the price.

Turkey joined the list in late August. The Wendrix, a tanker that is already on the EU and UK sanctions lists, left the Turkish port of Mersin carrying 200,000 barrels of gasoline. According to S&P Global CAS, it is bound for Primorsk. If so, this would represent the first confirmed shipment of Turkish-origin gasoline to Russia.

Kazakhstan is a separate avenue under discussion. Rather than direct gasoline exports, the proposal involves processing Russian crude at Kazakh refineries under a tolling arrangement, with some of the resulting fuel being sold in Kazakhstan and some returned to Russia.

At the same time, Kazakhstan’s crude oil exports through both Ust-Luga (down 16.9% year-on-year in July)  and Novorossiysk (down 2%) declined, while exports via the Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan route — whicy bypasses Russia — rose from 138,000 to 155,000 metric tons. Kazakhstan’s efforts to diversify its logistics, along with the risk of direct strikes on Russian Black Sea ports and the tankers carrying oil from them, are both contributing to the shift. Meanwhile, on Aug. 10–11, Russia agreed with Mongolia on a one-off shipment of 25,000 metric tons of gasoline and 5,000 metric tons of jet fuel.

Gasoline imports cannot be described as cheap. According to calculations by Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS), based on June data the cost of an “import alternative” to gasoline, calculated using Indian prices and including freight to Baltic ports, is 112,600 rubles per metric ton. That is 1.6 times the average domestic selling price of gasoline.

At the same time, the subsidy paid to importers — more than 50,000 rubles per metric ton — is 3.6 times higher than the payments made to oil companies under the domestic fuel-price damper. The difference is covered by the federal budget through a special import damper introduced on June 1 — without it, the purchases would be economically unviable for traders. According to estimates published in Kommersant, total import requirements before the market stabilizes are estimated at 400,000–500,000 metric tons a month, potentially 15–25% more than Belarus, India, Turkey and China combined can actually supply.

Over the next four months, the trajectory of imports will depend directly on which of the scenarios described above unfolds with regard to the strikes and repairs. Under the escalation scenario, dependence on imports will only grow, along with the burden on the budget from the import damper and the risk of logistical disruptions like the standoff that has left the shipment in Murmansk idle. Under the de-escalation scenario, by contrast, the share of imports in the overall fuel balance will decline, serving as a mere safety net as Russia's domestic refining capacity is repaired. 

Dozens of fake videos and cover images styled to look like content from well-known Western media outlets and organizations are circulating on X linking the two politicians to a range of fabricated scandals. The campaign was reported to The Insider by AntiBot4Navalny, a project that tracks the emergence and spread of fake videos on social media.

The fakes are a continuation of the campaign Matryoshka launched in Sweden on Aug. 18–19, less than a month ahead of the parliamentary election. At that time, seven fake videos mimicking content from well-known international media outlets appeared on X in the span of an hour, spreading false claims about Swedish politicians’ ties to pedophiles and financial criminals, preparations for election fraud, and attacks on opposition leaders.

The creators of the fakes have now merged the Swedish campaign with the disinformation onslaught against Attal, whom Matryoshka had begun targeting before. In early August, the network spread fake material mimicking BFM, RFI, Le Parisien, AFP, France 24, Le Figaro, Libération, and Le Monde, falsely attributing drug addiction, Parkinson’s disease, and other fabricated outrages to the French presidential candidate.

One of the new videos claims that Attal supposedly vacationed in Baden-Baden with a certain Volker Pelle, whom the video’s creators describe as one of the key organizers of a scheme to traffic children from Africa, China, Vietnam, and Thailand to pedophiles in Europe. The same storyline draws in Kristersson, claiming his family used Pelle’s services to adopt three children.

The video’s creators also allege that Attal discussed his involvement in illegal adoptions with Pelle, and that the French politician and his former partner Stéphane Séjourné supposedly planned to adopt a child to boost their falling approval ratings. No evidence is provided for any of these claims. However, to lend the story at least a hint of credibility, the creators of the fake news attribute a comment to a France 24 journalist who supposedly asks why Attal did not use the legal adoption process and instead turned to “the most notorious supplier of victims.”

Another fake video, designed to look like a Euronews segment, claims that Kristersson’s approval rating dropped by 30% after he spoke out about Russian disinformation. The creators again draw a parallel with Attal, claiming that talk of Russian interference is “poison” for Kristersson and his Moderate Party ahead of the election in Sweden. The video features a quote attributed to Euronews editorial director Claus Strunz claiming that politicians who talk about Russian disinformation are supposedly committing “political suicide.”

In addition to videos, the network is spreading fabricated front pages of European newspapers. A fake cover of La Tribune dated Aug. 25 claims that French President Emmanuel Macron supposedly refused to speak with Attal after a “scandal involving drug use.” The large headline reads “Go to hell!”

Additionally, a fake Libération front page carries an announcement claiming that Macron supposedly “distanced himself from Attal after a drug scandal.” Meanwhile, the cover’s main story is about a completely different topic — political disputes over water following a drought and extreme heat in France.

Fake covers of Expressen and Svenska Dagbladet aimed at a Swedish audience mock Kristersson and Attal together. The first, featuring photos of the two, carries the caption: “These two are at least as dumb as Beavis and Butt-Head.” In the second, the politicians’ faces are superimposed on the bodies of the cartoon characters, with a headline calling them “Europe’s Beavis and Butt-Head.” Beneath the image is a caption reading: “Ulf Kristersson and Gabriel Attal — clinical idiots who have taken over Europe.”

Matryoshka is a Kremlin-linked network of bots, trolls, and coordinated anonymous media resources that specializes in mass disinformation campaigns. Its signature tool is short videos bearing the logos of reputable Western media outlets, universities, government bodies, and international organizations that are then spread using X, Telegram, Bluesky, and private group chats. The network’s favorite technique is to seize on a real news event and build a fabricated narrative around it using real names, brands, and organizations.

The new wave appeared amid the upcoming Riksdag election in Sweden, scheduled for Sept. 13. The ruling bloc, led by Kristersson’s Moderate Party, is being challenged by a center-left bloc led by the Social Democrats. According to an Ipsos poll published on Aug. 25, the opposition bloc has 52.4% support, while the ruling bloc has 45.6%.

At the same time, Matryoshka is targeting candidates in the French presidential election, set to take place in spring 2027. Attal, who served as prime minister in 2024 and now leads the presidential party Renaissance, officially announced his candidacy on May 22. Notably, this is not the first wave of Matryoshka fakes targeting Attal.

At the same time, the network is running disinformation campaigns in other European countries where elections are scheduled soon. Several regional and local elections will take place in Germany in September, and as The Insider has previously reported, Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) issued an official warning about a Russian disinformation campaign. In August, Matryoshka bots spread posts on X using the hashtag #TimeToDivideGermany, promoting the re-division of the country into East and West Germany while calling it a “historical necessity.”

In August 2025, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, acting on a request from the Ministry of Industry and Trade, dismissed Russia’s trade representative in Austria, 67-year-old Andrei Plotnikov — purportedly due to “the expiration of his fixed-term service contract.”

Ever since the Soviet trade mission in Austria opened in 1921, the post of trade representative has always been reserved for a military intelligence officer. Outside the period of Nazi Germany’s occupation of Austria during WWII, Moscow’s representative in Vienna has always been a professional spy.

Trade representative Plotnikov worked in Austria for four years and gave interviews fairly often about trade turnover between the two countries. However, these conversations were merely cover. Plotnikov in fact held the rank of colonel and doubled as the deputy GRU station chief in Vienna, where he demonstrated solid operational results. Plotnikov’s espionage interests included local politicians and journalists, along with the heads of major firms. He also oversaw the Russian-Austrian Business Council, which stopped operating after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began.

“Andrei Nikolaevich [Plotnikov] was fired right after his birthday, and it was an undeserved insult. He’s a very well-known person, and they could easily have signed him to another three-year contract. Look at Alexander Bogatyr, who was in Cuba for nine years, and that was fine,” a source at the Ministry of Industry and Trade complained to The Insider.

At the GRU, Plotnikov was called “our legend,” and his superiors held him up as an example to other staff. When Plotnikov was still a young military intelligence officer, he was sent to West Berlin to serve as the Soviet warden at Spandau Prison. At the time, former close Hitler associate Rudolf Hess was still serving out his life sentence there. In 1987, Hess killed himself, and a version of the story still circulates among neo-Nazi groups that claim he was killed by British intelligence services. Plotnikov wrote a book, The Mystery of Rudolf Hess’s Death: A Warden’s Diary, in which he too arrived at highly questionable conclusions.

After Germany, Plotnikov continued his GRU service and graduated from the Military Diplomatic Academy. He was then assigned to Rosvooruzheniye (now Rosoboronexport, the Russian state-owned defense export agency), where he headed the Southeast Asia desk. From 2003 to 2009, Plotnikov spied in China under cover as a Russian trade mission employee, and before being sent to Austria, he headed Rostec’s representative office in Germany.

Following a series of high-profile spy scandals resulting from reporting by The Insider, Austrian authorities have begun paying much closer attention to Russian diplomats and journalists. The Austrian Foreign Ministry rejected all trade representative candidates proposed by Moscow, forcing the mission to draw on personnel already present in Vienna.

The initial candidate for “chief trader” was Alexander Zherikhov, whose father, Alexander Zherikhov Sr., headed Russia’s customs service from 2004 to 2006 and now holds the post of advisor to the CEO of Gazprom Neft. However, Artem Klimentyev was put in charge of trade instead. 

Klimentyev’s mother, Svetlana, is a well-known figure in financial circles, previously working at Mezhprombank and at the Moscow representative office of the now-defunct British company Fort Trading Corporation Limited. Svetlana currently works on the management side of the Moscow Venture Fund.

Klimentyev himself graduated from the Academy of Foreign Trade, and in 2018 his mother arranged for him to become a consultant in the Department of European and North American Countries and International Organizations at the Ministry of Economic Development. From there, he moved to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, where he headed a department until his departure for Austria.

Notably, the reshuffle in Vienna did not help improve trade turnover between the two countries, which in 2025 was down by 74% year-on-year, with a further decline expected for 2026.                                                    

Algeria, the gateway to Africa

The dismissal lists at the Ministry of Industry and Trade are drawn up by First Deputy Minister Kirill Lysogorsky, who directly oversees the trade missions. As it turns out, Lysogorsky is far from an outsider to the GRU — a graduate of the Russian Military Academy of the Strategic Missile Forces, he previously headed government departments connected with the defense industry and arms supplies.

“Lysogorsky may be an important figure now, but he used to be just an errand boy running after Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov — together they traveled to half the world,” a source at the ministry told The Insider.

In addition to Plotnikov, in September 2025 career GRU officer Ivan Nalich, Russia’s trade representative in Algeria, was put on Lysogorsky’s “chopping block.” Nalich had worked in North Africa for eight years and had built up an extensive network of contacts among military officers, officials, and public figures. “Algeria is the gateway to Africa,” Nalich said in one interview.

“Trade representative” Nalich also has a classic spy’s biography. In 2003, he graduated from the Institute of Asian and African Studies at Moscow State University, where he appears to have caught the eye of GRU recruiters. After graduation, Nalich took a job at the RIA Novosti state news agency, covering Middle Eastern affairs. In 2005, he moved to Rosoboronexport. Then, from 2009 to 2011, he worked in various positions at Rostec before returning to Rosoboronexport. Nalich subsequently spent five years spying in Morocco before being sent to Algeria as trade representative in 2019. 

Nalich seems to have inherited a knack for espionage from his KGB grandfather.

The GRU now has a standing joke that after being fired from the Ministry of Industry and Trade, Nalich will become a backup dancer for his cousin — the well-known performer Pyotr Nalich. 

In place of Nalich, Prime Minister Mishustin appointed 56-year-old Alexei Shatilov as Russia’s new trade representative in Algeria. Shatilov had worked for the Presidential Executive Office since the late 1990s in several capacities, and his last post at the Presidential Executive Office was as advisor in the foreign economic activity department of the president’s expert directorate. He had previously worked as trade representative in Algeria and had also spent time in the UAE and Qatar. He is considered to be part of the inner circle of Igor Neverov, head of the president’s foreign policy directorate. Neverov is said to have lobbied for his protégé’s reappointment to Africa. 

In a recent interview, Shatilov praised Algeria for its pro-Moscow orientation and encouraged Russian companies to enter the local market. The trade representative did not mention, however, that the country is considered one of the most corrupt in Africa. The initial budget for the highway connecting Algeria with Morocco and Tunisia was $6 billion, but corruption drove the final cost to $17 billion — including $5 billion in kickbacks for local officials.                                       

A comedian replaces a smuggler

In January 2023, Cuba welcomed a new Russian trade representative, Sergei Baldin. Before Havana, he had headed the trade and economic department at the Russian embassy in Portugal and the Russian trade mission in Brazil.

An analysis of Baldin’s activities shows that in Brazil he mainly represented Rosoboronexport’s interests. For example, the trade representative actively negotiated Russia’s entry into the Latin American arms market and took part in Latin America Aero & Defence military fairs in Rio de Janeiro.

Baldin is also credited with the successful negotiations to establish visa-free travel between Russia and Brazil, a development that clearly pleased the GRU and the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR). While in Cuba, Baldin spoke in interviews about the good prospects for trade between Moscow and Havana. However, in June 2026, he unexpectedly resigned before his contract had even ended.

As The Insider learned, Baldin had concealed from his superiors at the Ministry of Industry and Trade the fact that he was being prosecuted for smuggling. On May 2, 2021, he flew into Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport from Lisbon and headed for the exit through the green channel. When a customs officer asked whether he had any undeclared currency, Baldin said no. However, during an inspection, officers found nearly $52,000 on him.

Trade representative Baldin concealed from his superiors at the Ministry of Industry and Trade the fact that he was being prosecuted for smuggling

To replace Baldin, Moscow appointed Vakhtang Mosashvili as its new trade representative. His father, Vyacheslav Mosashvili, is a close acquaintance and former Ministry of Transport colleague of Putin aide Igor Levitin.

The younger Mosashvili’s résumé, obtained by The Insider, matches all of the expectations for a member of a nomenklatura family: “Attended a school at the Russian embassy in Belgium, graduated from the law faculty of the Russian State University for the Humanities. Worked at Aeroflot and at trade missions in Hungary and Spain.”

In the Russian mission in Havana, Mosashvili is known as an irrepressible “jokester,” the life of the party at gatherings, and a fan of off-color jokes. The trade representative’s peculiar sense of humor is showcased in his now-deleted account on Odnoklassniki social network, where he wrote about himself: “Three years’ imprisonment under Article 162, Part 1 of the Russian Criminal Code, ‘Robbery,’ served at the PLS penal colony in Solikamsk. Broke, I don’t have a car, I curse, I’m schizophrenic, neurasthenic, asthmatic, I pick my nose, I have dandruff, worms, gonorrhea, I sniff glue, gasoline, and stain remover.”

A few more “trade representatives” from military intelligence also fell under Deputy Minister Lysogorsky’s cuts, but no replacements have yet been found for them. Vladislav Darvay left Moldova in September 2024, and The Insider later published wiretaps which showed that he had organized a visit to Russia by fraudster-oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc, who stands accused of involvement in running $20 billion in corrupt Russian money through the “Moldovan laundromat”. Plahotniuc met with Kremlin official Dmitry Kozak and discussed interference in Moldova’s elections. However, the plan fell through when Plahotniuc was arrested, Kozak was fired, the Kremlin’s preferred candidates lost the election, and Darvay was barred from entering the country.

In Syria, espionage will continue

In some countries, however, Russian spies have not been replaced by “well-connected” substitutes from the civilian sector. In Syria, for instance, the GRU again managed to appoint one of its own to the trade representative post — 55-year-old career intelligence officer Vladimir Noskov. He replaces GRU officer Georgy Asatryan, who was recalled to Moscow and put forward for an award for the successful evacuation of Russian military personnel and equipment from bases in Syria to Libya.

Colonel Noskov graduated from the Military Diplomatic Academy, was seconded to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and spied in Lebanon, Egypt, and Qatar (facts that did not prevent his son from getting a job at Bain & Company, a U.S. entity closely tied to Anatoly Chubais).

As for his appointment to Syria, it is likely that no one from the “well-connected” crowd, accustomed to a comfortable life, wanted an assignment to that troubled country. 

Military-tactical gear accounted for the largest share. Over the year, users ordered more than 527,000 such items worth 9.14 billion rubles ($106.2 million). Items in this group included body armor, ballistic helmets, tactical vests, protective plates, and neck and shoulder protection.

Nearly 157,700 pieces of body armor were ordered for 5.07 billion rubles ($58.9 million). The average order value was 32,300 rubles ($375). Another 1.48 billion rubles ($17.2 million) went toward the purchase of 81,100 ballistic helmets, and 1.2 billion rubles ($13.9 million) was used to buy nearly 159,000 tactical vests and belts.

Military optics were ordered nearly 350,000 times over the year at a total of 7.22 billion rubles ($83.9 million). This group included optical, collimator, digital, and thermal imaging sights, night vision devices, and thermal imagers. Thermal imaging sights turned out to be the most expensive: more than 28,000 units were ordered at an average price of about 140,000 rubles ($1,600).

Users spent 6.26 billion rubles ($72.7 million) on drones and related products, while about 3 billion rubles ($34.9 million) went toward 554,000 accessories, including frames, propellers, receivers, and cameras for building custom drones. Another 1.15 billion rubles ($13.3 million) was spent on batteries, and about 1.7 billion rubles ($19.7 million) on fully assembled drones.

Components and accessories for small arms were ordered for nearly 2.46 billion rubles ($28.5 million). Weapon grips were the most frequently purchased item — more than 132,500 units for 307 million rubles ($3.5 million). However, the highest revenue in this group came from stocks: 58,500 units were ordered for nearly 605 million rubles ($7 million).

The calculations are based on categories from Ozon’s internal analytics that Verstka classified as military or dual-use goods. These may include items that end up being used for civilian purposes, and the data does not make it possible to identify the buyers or end recipients of the goods. Ozon has thus far not commented on the findings.

Several Ozon logistics centers across Russia have come under aerial attack in recent days following a series of strikes against facilities belonging to its chief competitor in the Russian market, the Wildberries online marketplace. The first confirmed strike on an Ozon warehouse occurred on Aug. 22 in Chapayevsk, Samara Region, leading to a fire and several injuries. In the following days, attacks and the threat of strikes affected the company’s facilities in several more regions, and on Aug. 27, Ozon reported attempted attacks on warehouses in Ufa and Orenburg.

However, Yaroslavl Region Governor Mikhail Yevraev warned of a drone threat early in the morning, and authorities blocked the route out of Yaroslavl toward Moscow starting from the intersection of Moskovsky Avenue and the Yugo-Zapadnaya Ring Road. Buses were rerouted via Suzdalskoye Highway and Kalinina Street, and intermunicipal routes along the blocked section of the M8 highway were temporarily suspended.

Yevraev later reported that kindergartens No. 98 and No. 28 had been closed “due to the need to eliminate the consequences of a drone attack.” Children were redirected to nearby preschools, though the governor did not specify the nature of the damage. Exilenova+ also published footage showing blown-out windows and damage to apartment buildings. There is no information on casualties so far.

Slavneft-YANOS was launched in 1961. The plant processes roughly 15 million metric tons of oil per year, making it one of Russia’s five largest oil refineries. Slavneft’s main refining asset, YANOS, produces Euro-5 gasoline and diesel fuel, aviation kerosene, jet fuel, oils, bitumen, liquefied gas, and fuel oil. The company is controlled jointly by Rosneft and Gazprom Neft on a parity basis.

This is not the first fire the plant has experienced in 2026, as Ukrainian attacks on March 28, April 26, May 8 and 22, July 6 and 16, and August 6 led to similar consequences. After the Aug. 6 attack, regional governor Yevraev confirmed that drone debris had hit the refinery’s storage tanks and caused a fire, but only did so several hours after the first eyewitness reports.

A number of known details about Sechkov match information about the victim that were previously reported by Russian media. According to 78.ru, the victim was a native of Ryazan named “Sergei S.,” and his wife, who was injured in the explosion, was named Anna. According to leaked data reviewed by Agentstvo, Sechkov was 43 years old, was born in Ryazan, and his wife’s name is Anna. In addition, Sechkov’s registered address is located roughly a hundred meters from the site of the explosion.

The Ukrainian project Myrotvorets has a profile for Sergei Sergeevich Sechkov on its website, listing him with the rank of major in military unit 12633 — the 332nd Separate Guards Helicopter Regiment, part of the 6th Air Force and Air Defense Army. The St. Petersburg outlet Fontanka had previously written that the victim served in the Air Force and Air Defense troops, but referred to him as a lieutenant colonel.

In May 2022, Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR) stated that servicemen of the 332nd Separate Guards Helicopter Regiment had taken part in the war against Ukraine. The HUR accused the unit of carrying out missile and bomb strikes on civilians in the Slobozhanske sector.

The car explosion in question took place on the morning of Aug. 27 near a store on Kolpinskoye Highway in the Slavyanka neighborhood of St. Petersburg. The serviceman inside the car was killed, and his wife was injured and hospitalized. The St. Petersburg office of the Investigative Committee confirmed the serviceman’s death and reported that a criminal case had been opened “over the car catching fire,” without specifying the charge.

Fontanka claims that a 24-year-old Russian woman planted the homemade explosive device under the car. According to the outlet’s account, on the evening of Aug. 26 she attached the device to the underside of the car beneath the driver’s seat, then headed to Pulkovo Airport and departed for Turkey at around five o’clock in the morning — a few hours before the explosion. Allegedly, she subsequently moved on to Chișinău, Moldova. The outlet does not name her or disclose the source of this information. Russian law enforcement agencies have not made any official statements about a search for a suspect.

The Ukrainian side has not confirmed involvement in the explosion, and no one has claimed responsibility for it.

Earlier, 78.ru reported that the victim had told his superiors he was “on a kill list.”

When Ukraine’s strike campaign against Russian oil refineries triggered a fuel crisis in June, farmers and market experts feared that part of the harvest could simply be lost. The grain harvest is indeed running late this year because of diesel shortages, Kuban farmer Andrei (name changed) tells The Insider:

“We only finished harvesting in August. That’s exceptionally late for us. And I’m seeing the same thing in neighboring regions. In Stavropol, colleagues are only now harvesting winter rapeseed, which is usually done in early July. The rapeseed is already shedding its seeds — it’s a very vulnerable crop when it stays in the field too long. Not all farms in Kuban have finished harvesting their wheat either. If it rains, the wheat could shed its grain and fall in quality.”

A crop left in the field past maturity not only produces less but also loses market value. For example, rain reduces protein and gluten content in winter wheat that is already ripe, and in Stavropol, farmers really are complaining en masse about problems with the harvest with some simply losing up to a third of their crop due to the lack of diesel. 

Agriculture has been hit not only by the fuel shortage itself but also by government measures aimed at addressing it. Some have their own filling stations and buy diesel in bulk, but those who depend on regular gas stations have been affected by the same purchasing limits as everyone else. As farmer Andrei explains:

“It’s a perfectly workable arrangement, and gas stations had a discount system. But when they introduced fuel limits, that hit us too. Many combines in the district came to a halt. Some gas stations have now realized that they need to sell fuel to farmers. The local administration got involved, drew up lists, and farmers can drive up and refuel. But they were a month and a half late with that measure. At some gas stations in Kuban, they still refuse to dispense diesel into containers, saying you have to arrive in a vehicle and fill the tank directly. But if farmers arrive at gas stations in their tractors and combines, there will be total gridlock. The highways will be blocked, and we have a huge flow of people heading to the coast right now.”

Farms that buy fuel in bulk and refuel their own machinery face problems of their own. Paradoxically, wholesale diesel prices are currently higher than retail prices (wholesale fuel is sold at exchange prices, while major filling-station chains are holding down retail price increases).

Andrei cites the situation in his home region of Krasnodar. There, the wholesale price of diesel is more than 100 rubles per kilogram. Fuel bought on the exchange is measured by weight, which works out to roughly 85 rubles per liter. The retail price, meanwhile, has so far risen only to 76 rubles per liter.

Rostov region farmer Dmitry (name changed) tells The Insider that he is seeing even higher prices, but with the same gap between wholesale and retail: “There is simply no diesel, and everything is being delivered to farmers at a higher price — not the 80–90 rubles per liter you pay at a filling station, but 120. And the machinery consumes a huge amount. Working 40 hectares just once burns through 200 liters of diesel.”

There is simply no diesel, and farmers are being charged more for deliveries: not the 80–90 rubles per liter you pay at gas stations, but 120

Voronezh farmer Nikolai (name changed) says the fuel situation has improved since June: “It can be bought from suppliers at a more or less market price. It’s more expensive than at the beginning of the year, but not as critical as it was. It’s not three times more expensive than in February, but 60–70% more. However, as is so often the case in Russian agriculture, the situation has taken a turn for the worse elsewhere. Wheat prices have collapsed and continue to fall. They are already below the cost of production not just for this year, but even for last year.”

A double blow

The main consequence of higher fuel prices has been a sharp increase in the cost of agricultural production. At the same time, domestic grain prices have fallen to record lows as Ukrainian attacks have disrupted maritime logistics in the Black and Azov seas.

Farmers in Russia’s Black Sea regions and in the Ukrainian territories Moscow's forces currently occupy have historically relied on maritime exports. More than half of the grain produced there was shipped to Mediterranean countries and farther east.

Farmers are now facing a situation in which shipping in the Black and Azov seas has ground to a halt and their regular buyers have stopped purchasing. Ports are no longer accepting grain, and all receiving facilities are full, Dmitry says:

“On the domestic market, distilleries and bakeries have already bought enough for the next three months. Now those with storage facilities — traders and resellers — are buying wheat for 5–6 rubles per kilogram, compared with 14–15 rubles last August. Farmers are selling because they need to keep the wheat from rotting in the field — there wasn’t enough room in the storage facilities for all of it. They grew wheat for 10 rubles a kilo and are selling it for five or six. The harvest was also good this year. The quality, though, isn’t great — it’s more likely to be fourth-grade than third-grade.”

In some cases, harvesting the grain is now simply unprofitable, but farmers cannot just leave it in the field. As Dmitry explains: “First, birds will descend on it, then mice will multiply and devour half of next year’s crop. Second, unharvested wheat is a fire hazard: not only the field but the surrounding shelter belts could burn. Finally, plowing such a field the following year would be considerably harder and more expensive.”

You can’t leave the harvest in the field: birds will descend, mice will multiply, and unharvested wheat is a fire hazard

Anatoly Kolchik, head of the Rostov Region Grain Union, told Expert South that “the blockade of the Sea of Azov and the overload at Novorossiysk have driven domestic prices down to 6,000–12,000 rubles per ton, against production costs of 10,000–12,000 rubles.”

At the same time, according to Kolchik, “many farms are forced to sell grain for as little as 7 rubles per kilogram to pay wages, buy fuel and spare parts, and prepare for the autumn sowing season.” Even before the Ukrainian strikes on the Novorossiysk terminals, he had forecast that grain prices would be 40–50% below production costs.

What is happening to the grain terminals

On the night of Aug. 12, Ukrainian strikes on the port of Novorossiysk brought operations at the facility's two largest grain terminals to a halt. Two days later, grain analyst Andrei Sizov noted that navigation in the Sea of Azov had been suspended since July, while in the Black Sea “only Tuapse remains operational — the smallest of the deepwater terminals. Virtually all Russian grain exports through the Azov-Black Sea basin have come to a standstill.”

Ekaterina Yaressko of the Ukrainian investigative project Myrotvorets, which tracks grain shipments from occupied territories, providedThe Insider with a more cautious assessment: “One of Novorossiysk’s three grain terminals — NKHP — has indeed been shut down, and the situation with the other two remains unclear. At least one of them, KSK, is still operating. We can see that loading is continuing, but on a much smaller scale — the pace has slowed, and ships are waiting for extended periods.”

There is virtually no shipping in the Sea of Azov, the route through which grain from Crimea and other occupied territories was previously exported, Yaressko notes, and the Kerch-Yenikalsky and Azov-Don canals are closed. At first, cargo flows were redirected to Novorossiysk, home to three major terminals that have a combined annual capacity of 18–19 million tons of grain. In normal years, they did not operate at full capacity but still handled roughly one-third of Russia’s total grain exports. Loading there has now become nearly impossible as well.

As a result, wheat prices inside Russia continued to fall after the strikes on the city. According to calculations by Andrei Sizov, third-class wheat fell 2.8% during the week of Aug. 10–16, while fourth-class wheat fell 3.1%. The analyst expects prices to continue declining.

Global grain prices, meanwhile, are rising, notes Joseph Glauber of the International Food Policy Research Institute. By early August, they were already 25% above January levels and now stand at their highest point in two years.

The rise in global prices is the result of more than just the Ukrainian attacks on Russia’s maritime logistics and Russian strikes on Odesa. As Glauber told The Insider, “A poor harvest is expected in the United States, Canada, and across the Northern Hemisphere in general. Since the full-scale invasion, Ukraine has already shifted a significant share of its grain exports to land routes or the Danube. But this year, those routes are constrained by low water levels in the rivers."

Glauber also notes that there has not yet been any significant change in global stocks: reserves worldwide have not been depleted, nor are storage facilities in Russia and Ukraine overflowing. Still, these two countries now account for around 32% of global wheat trade, and it is difficult to say who will fill the gap in the market:

“Mediterranean countries and the Middle East are heavily dependent on Russia and Ukraine. They will have to turn to the United States, and possibly Argentina and Australia, but that will be expensive. In the long term, I think this niche will remain with Russia and Ukraine. Over the past several decades, both countries have demonstrated that they are capable of reclaiming their place in global food trade.”

But that is a question for the future. This year, the grain market has already taken a hit, and as analyst Andrei Sizov writes, "I think many producers will not survive this season — especially after several years of deteriorating financial conditions caused by export duties.”

Support measures

Russia’s Agriculture Ministry held a closed-door meeting to discuss support measures, Russian business publication RBC reportsed in mid-August. Three options were proposed: extending preferential loans for farmers, providing subsidies, and using state funds to buy grain in order to prop up demand.

The loans could be extended for up to one year, but only in regions with a grain surplus. This primarily concerns southern Russia and occupied Crimea, where the harvest is largely complete (and a good one at that) but farmers are unable to sell or export it because of Ukrainian attacks disrupting maritime logistics. There are no specifics on the subsidies yet, but as for government grain purchases, they are usually carried out by the state-owned United Grain Company (OZK). According to RBC, the company has already begun looking for available storage capacity.

Experts interviewed by RBC support the proposed measures. Ksenia Bolomatova, executive director of the Union of Grain Exporters and Producers, believes they would ease pressure on farmers’ working capital and allow them to prepare for the next sowing season. Ilya Bereznyuk, managing partner of Agro&Food Communications, said they would help bridge the cash-flow gap and prevent farmers from being forced to sell their grain at excessively low prices.

However, Alexander Korbut, vice president of the Russian Grain Union, openly acknowledged in an appearance on the Rural Hour program that government grain purchases might not work at all: “To fix the situation, we would need to purchase somewhere around 20–30 million tons of grain. We simply don’t have that kind of money in the budget. That’s one problem. And secondly, we don’t have enough storage capacity.” The intervention fund already holds around 3.7 million tons of grain.

To fix the situation, the government would need to purchase around 20–30 million tons of grain, but there is no money for that in the budget

Analyst Sizov calculated that subsidies capable of making a meaningful difference would require 340 billion rubles from the state budget. “Crop farming has no chance of receiving anything like that,” he concludes.

Another support measure involves assistance with shipping grain via routes that bypass the southern ports. The Russian government is preparing to allocate around 10 billion rubles ($116 million)to subsidize rail transportation of agricultural goods, Vedomosti reports. Since 2019, the Agriculture Ministry has set the annual volume of agricultural goods eligible for preferential rail rates — and the quota has already been exhausted for this year. Additional funding would allow it to be increased.

Sources who spoke to The Insider are skeptical about these plans. Joseph Glauber says the Baltic lacks sufficient infrastructure for grain imports, while Russia already engages in intensive trade with Iran through the Caspian Sea route: “I don’t know how much that could be increased to make up for Black Sea exports. In addition, Ukraine has already carried out successful drone strikes in the Caspian.”

Ekaterina Yaressko is also doubtful that grain shipments through the Caspian can be increased: “A lot of grain is already being transported there, so I doubt they can handle much more. There are large grain terminals at Vysotsk and Ust-Luga on the Baltic, but they are already being used, and the bottleneck there will be the rail network.”

Indeed, Baltic grain terminals are already busy. Historically, they have handled grain from Central Russia, the Volga region, the Urals, and Siberia. Igor Petrin, CEO of the Petrakovskoye agricultural company in Novosibirsk Region, told Business FM that southern grain will now be redirected to northern ports at preferential rates, effectively displacing Siberian producers. “The only place we can ship to today is China by rail,” Petrin said.

Just like in the south, the harvest in Novosibirsk Region is still in full swing, and it is facing many of the same challenges. The pea harvest is already complete, but there is no demand for it. Wheat and barley harvesting has only just begun, but buyers are offering 10–15% less than last year.

Farmers’ response

Petrin plans to switch to less conventional crop, saying that some farmers in Novosibirsk Region are already reducing their planted acreage, while others have decided to leave agriculture altogether. Another source in the same Business FM article, Alexei Zhdanov, chairman of the council of the Association of Peasant Farms and Agricultural Cooperatives of Rostov Region, predicts that planted acreage will shrink by 30–40%.

Kuban farmer Andrei has also decided to reduce his wheat acreage. “Our country doesn’t need it. We don’t see any support. I’m going to change my crop rotation in favor of higher-margin crops, because that’s the only way to make it work,” he told The Insider.

Farmers say that the fuel shortages and the disruption to maritime logistics are further exacerbating problems that began accumulating due to the start of the full-scale war in 2022. As Rostov farmer Dmitry explains: 

“When the ‘special military operation’ began, tractor drivers were taken away en masse, and now they’re tank crews. There were a lot of unreliable people and alcoholics working in unskilled jobs — hand this over, fetch that, tighten a nut. They were also taken away en masse for the ‘special military operation,’ and half of them have already been [killed]. So many farmers shut down their operations, especially among the older generation. They sold off their machinery and kept just 50 hectares to feed their livestock.”

Over the past four years, the prices of fertilizer, agrochemicals, and spare parts have risen sharply. Dmitry continues: “Before the ‘special military operation,’ it cost three rubles to grow a kilogram of wheat. Then it went up to six rubles. And now, with diesel getting more expensive, it has reached nine.”

Agricultural machinery has become 50–80% more expensive over the past four years, Andrei adds, with some equipment rising even more. A tractor he had planned to buy for 6 million rubles before the full-scale invasion now costs 12 million.

For now, the farmers who spoke to The Insider still retain some hope. Andrei has finished harvesting and is in no hurry to sell his crop, waiting to see what happens in the market. Dmitry is counting on the ruble weakening: “The dollar is low right now. It will rise, and grain will become more expensive. There’s still hope that prices will go up and the ports will reopen. A farmer’s entire life is basically a lottery — whether you sow early or late, whether you apply those fertilizers or not, whether you start harvesting on time or not. That’s the situation now, but nobody knows what next year will bring.”

A farmer’s entire life is basically a lottery: whether you sow early or late, whether you apply those fertilizers or not, whether you start harvesting on time or not

Anatoly Kolchik, director of the Grain Union of Agricultural Producers of Rostov Region, told Expert South that he knows farmers who are already putting their farms up for sale. Indeed, specialized marketplaces now carry numerous new listings for operating agricultural businesses. A Stavropol realtor who specializes in this type of property told The Insider that there is no rush to sell, but that the number of small farms — those of up to 1,000 hectares — on the market has clearly increased.

Several sellers also responded to The Insider’s inquiries. The owner of a berry farm in Rostov Region said prices in his sector had collapsed this year and that he had decided to change professions. Another seller, who represents the owner of a grain farm in the same region, described the situation in the third person: “There is one owner, and he has four companies. He’s managing, but the quality of the work is declining. A lot of people have been taken for the ‘special military operation,’ and there’s no team left to develop the business. He wants to sell one company and improve the performance of the others.”

For decades, European carmakers operated in familiar and relatively predictable conditions. They produced cars with internal combustion engines, sold them on the domestic market, and exported them around the world — using China and Russia as important growth markets while turning technological and engineering breakthroughts into lasting competitive advantages. That world is no more, and the scale of the transformation goes far beyond a normal industry cycle.

While most European carmakers remain profitable and retain strong brands, their engineering expertise, global supplier networks, and access to political support no longer guarantee the same resilience. Porsche is a telling example: in 2025, one of Europe’s most profitable premium brands faced a sharp drop in profits, forcing the company to rethink its strategy, cut costs, and prepare new measures to streamline the business. 

Trouble can be found at all levels of the market. Dacia, the budget brand owned by Renault Group, reported a 9% year-on-year decline in sales in the first half of 2026, and Volkswagen, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz are among the brands cutting costs and negotiating with trade unions over large-scale job cuts. As a result, Bosch, ZF, and other automotive suppliers are restructuring their businesses and cutting staff.

Some European carmakers are, for example, beginning to look to the defense industry — not because they plan to become arms manufacturers, but to utilize their spare producition capacity while ensuring that engineers and workers do not find themselves out of a job. 

Some European carmakers are beginning to look to the defense industry to avoid closing plants

The U.S. is becoming a less predictable market for European brands because of Donald Trump’s tariff policies. At the same time, Chinese electric and hybrid vehicle makers are entering the European market in increasing numbers, while China has already taken the leading position in global vehicle exports.

The electric vehicle revolution is changing the structure of the industry. These cars are mechanically less complex than those with internal combustion engines, but their performance depends on developing the relevant batteries, software, electronics, and vehicle platforms — areas where China has proved particularly strong not only in terms of cost, but also in the speed with which it develops and implements new technologies. Chinese manufacturers are rapidly advancing battery production, intelligent vehicle functions, driver-assistance systems, and software architecture. Their competitive pressure therefore cannot be explained solely by government subsidies or lower costs. In short, this is already a full-fledged technological competition.

As a result, Chinese automakers are arriving in foreign markets with increasingly sophisticated designs, expanding dealer networks, and aggressive marketing strategies, and their cars are gradually becoming an acceptable and rational choice for European consumers. According to some estimates, the combined market share of the largest Chinese automakers in Europe already exceeds 10%, and their presence is particularly evident in the electrified vehicle segment.

Chinese manufacturers enjoy a range of advantages: a huge domestic market that provides economies of scale, the security that comes from government support, and control over supply chains for EV batteries, critical minerals, and rare earth elements. They can also expand their exports in markets like Russia, which Western brands pulled out of following Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Chinese companies remained in the Russian market and turned it into a significant export and local assembly base.

As a result, Europe is facing not only Chinese competition within the EU but also a changing global geography of automotive markets. Today, the question is not whether the European car industry has a future — short answer: it does. The question is whether that future will remain European in terms of technology, value added, and strategic control.

The market is recovering, but not under the old rules

Car sales in the EU are recovering, albeit very slowly. In 2025, the number of new car registrations in the EU increased by just 2%, remaining below pre-pandemic levels, but in the first half of 2026 it grew by a much healthier 6%. Demand is recovering, but what actually matters more for European carmakers is the share of the market captured by their brands.

Here it is important to note that the structure of demand itself is changing rapidly. The share of petrol and diesel models, segments where European carmakers enjoyed engineering and manufacturing advantages for decades, is shrinking. In 2025, vehicles in these categories accounted for just 35.5% of new cars in 2025, a figure that fell to 30% in the first half of 2026. At the same time, hybrids accounted for 37%, fully electric vehicles for 21%, and plug-in hybrids for 10%.

Legacy capabilities do not disappear overnight, but they gradually lose their importance. Plants and engineering centers geared toward producing internal combustion engines, transmissions, exhaust systems, and complex mechanical components must gradually adapt to a new architecture. This requires investment, but finding the necessary funds is difficult amid slowing demand and intensifying competition.

Even the countervailing duties imposed by the EU on imports of electric vehicles made in China have failed to reverse the trend. One reason is that Chinese carmakers are beginning to move beyond a simple export model toward localizing production in Europe. The aim is to establish a foothold within the European industrial system, as exporting finished vehicles from China to the EU is becoming more difficult because of tariffs, trade investigations, and political pressure.

For example, Chinese automaker BYD is building its first European passenger-car plant in Hungary and is already developing a local supplier network around it, with plans to gradually make local production a key pillar of its European sales. In addition, SAIC has announced plans to establish its first production site in Spain, XPeng has begun producing electric vehicles at Magna’s facilities in Austria, and Chery is starting production at Nissan’s former plant in Spain.

For Chinese manufacturers, this localization serves several purposes at once: it reduces tariff and logistical risks, brings production closer to consumers, immunizes them to future localization requirements, and makes their presence politically more acceptable to European governments.

European carmakers themselves are increasingly looking to cooperation with Chinese companies as a way to close technological gaps more quickly, utilize production capacity, preserve jobs, and produce more affordable electric vehicles.

European carmakers are increasingly looking to cooperation with Chinese companies as a way to utilize production capacity and preserve jobs

Stellantis, for example, is developing a partnership with Leapmotor and is discussing production of related models at its plants in Zaragoza and Madrid, while Volkswagen is considering using its underutilized European plants to produce Chinese cars.

In the short term, such cooperation looks pragmatic. After all, idle plants go back to work, localities preserve jobs, and European companies gain access to cheaper, faster solutions. But in the long term, it points to a deeper problem: European carmakers are beginning to rely on Chinese technologies, platforms, and production systems.

That is why market growth alone can not solve the problem, as Europe’s car industry may sell more cars while simultaneously losing ground in the segments that matter most for future growth. The danger is not that European brands will go bankrupt and disappear tomorrow. The danger is that an industry that was once a symbol of industrial power will retain only part of the local value added while losing control over key technologies, software architecture, and battery supplies.

The danger of incentives and the Russian lesson in localization

It is in this context that the Industrial Accelerator Act is emerging — a new attempt by the EU to respond to the challenge not only with tariffs, but also with a more active industrial policy. In the automotive sector, its underlying idea is simple: if Europe wants to preserve its car industry, it needs to support not just car sales in the European market, but also production, technology development, and value creation within Europe itself.

This is an important shift for the EU. For a long time, the European economic model was built around open markets, complex cross-border supply chains, and limited government involvement when it came to directly supporting industry. However, under circumstances of Chinese pressure, U.S. protectionism, the war in Ukraine, energy volatility, and disruptions to logistics and supply chains, the industrial base can no longer be taken for granted — it needs not only to be regulated, but also protected, supported, and directed.

For the car industry, the Industrial Accelerator Act means that financial support, public procurement, corporate fleets, and certain demand-side incentives will increasingly be tied to Made in EU criteria. At first glance, the logic is sound. Europe is seeking to leverage its greatest asset — its large domestic market — and its regulatory power. Rather than shutting itself off from China, it aims to create conditions in which European demand supports European production. But this is precisely where the main difficulty begins. The Industrial Accelerator Act could turn into a costly protectionist mechanism that preserves plants and jobs without addressing the industry’s underlying competitiveness problem.

The first risk is higher costs. If European-origin requirements prove too stringent, manufacturers will have to restructure their supply chains in favor of EU-based suppliers, even if their products are more expensive and less competitive. As a result, European cars could ultimately lose out to Chinese competitors on price, further diminishing their market share.

The second risk is tied to the very nature of European supply chains. The European car industry's production system includes entities in the UK, Turkey, Morocco, and the Western Balkans (to say nothing of Asian suppliers of electronics and battery components), and it depends on global raw-material supply networks. The question of “European content” is therefore far more complicated than it may seem. What should count as a European car, and how should its degree of localization be calculated: by the location of final assembly, the share of European components, the origin of the battery, the role of engineering and software development, the platform, or control over the supply chain?

The third risk is administrative. The more complex the Made in EU criteria become, the more European regulators will have to monitor, measure, and administer compliance. They will need to calculate the share of local content, verify the origin of components, assess the specifics of battery, electronics, and software production, evaluate second- and third-tier suppliers, and determine which companies are genuinely creating European added value and which are merely adapting to the requirements on paper. Such a system inevitably requires industry expertise in order to conduct inspections and write reports, and the necessity of granting certain exemptions will require an expanded administrative apparatus.

This is precisely where Russia’s experience can offer Europe a useful lesson. Of course, Europe has far stronger technological capabilities and institutions, a more developed industrial base, and a more competitive environment. But Russia’s attempts at localization show how quickly industrial policy can turn into a system of state paternalism — one in which companies begin competing less for consumers than to meet regulatory criteria and secure access to government support.

Before 2022, Russia used almost the entire range of tools to protect and support its car industry: import tariffs, incentives for importing components, subsidies, demand-support programs, special investment contracts, tax breaks, a vehicle scrappage fee, and a points-based system for assessing localization, to name but a few measures.

This system did produce results. Car imports declined, plants operated by leading global automakers were established in Russia, automotive clusters emerged and a local component industry developed. But the system did not create full technological self-sufficiency — or what is often called technological sovereignty — for the industry. Moreover, temporary support mechanisms gradually became a permanent feature of the industry.

The Russian assembly regime introduced in 2005 initially granted automakers preferential treatment on imports of automotive components for up to eight years in exchange for building plants and increasing localization. Over time, some restrictions were eased, agreements were renegotiated, localization requirements were tightened, and the incentives and subsidies evolved. After the industrial assembly regime ended, the industry moved on to special investment contracts that preserved preferential treatment in exchange for further localization and investment.

As a result, localization became not a stepping stone toward full-fledged competition, but part of an entrenched system of government support. Manufacturers grew accustomed to access to subsidies, government procurement contracts, and demand-support programs that depended not only on the quality and price of their cars, but also on how well they met localization criteria. This changed the incentives: instead of constantly cutting costs, updating their model lineups, and competing in foreign markets, companies increasingly learned to operate within a system of rules, points, and preferential treatment.

Localization became not a stepping stone toward full-fledged competition, but part of an entrenched system of government support

After Western companies left Russia in 2022, it became clear that the level of localization achieved often concealed dependence on foreign platforms, subcomponents, electronics, software, and engineering solutions. As a result, the Russian market was quickly flooded with Chinese brands, while production in many cases shifted to large-scale assembly based on Chinese technology.

The abrupt replacement of Western brands with Chinese ones led not to greater industrial self-sufficiency, but to a technological downgrade: the industry was forced to adapt to basic assembly operations, dependence on supplies from China, a lack of investment in plants, and rising car prices. In effect, since 2022 the Russian car industry has been undergoing a structural crisis, and the country itself is turning into a land of used cars.

This lesson is particularly important for Europe: localization by itself does not equal competitiveness. It is possible to ensure that more components are formally produced in Europe without guaranteeing leadership in the most important parts of the automotive value chain. Plants can be preserved while technological control is lost. Subsidies and preferential treatment can be expanded while creating an industry more focused on optimizing operations to meet regulatory criteria than on cutting costs and accelerating innovation.

The Industrial Accelerator Act will therefore succeed only if it does not become a European version of the “import substitution trap” that Russia fell into. Its goal should not be to reduce Chinese competition at any cost, drive out foreign suppliers, or blindly increase the formal share of European components. Instead, the goal should be to strengthen the real sources of competitiveness — battery technologies, charging infrastructure, software architecture, suppliers of critical components, and a skilled workforce — while ensuring that the industry has access to affordable energy, fast and streamlined permitting procedures, and funding for research and development.

Europe needs to protect its car industry, but more importantly, it must not shield it from the need to adapt to changing realities. Industrial policy should help European companies become stronger competitors, rather than simply allow them to operate behind a protective wall of rules, subsidies, and localization points. If the Industrial Accelerator Act becomes a modernization tool focused on technology, productivity, cost reduction, and the development of European value chains, then the current crisis could become not the beginning of a long period of decline but the start of a successful transition to a new model. If, however, initiatives focus on protectionism and bureaucratic accounting of “European content,” the continent risks preserving its car plants while losing the most important thing: control over the technologies that will shape the future of the automotive industry.

After Baring Vostok exited Russia, its stake in Ozon ended up with O23, a company established shortly before the deal. Investor Alexander Chachava was named as the formal ultimate owner of the stake, and the deal was valued at roughly 38 billion rubles ($441.3 million). However, the ACF took note of O23’s filings: since August 2024, its owner has been listed as an unnamed joint-stock company, with Alexei Yegorov as director. By matching identical loans between companies headed by Yegorov, investigators concluded that O23 belongs to JSC Korporatsiya 42, which in turn belongs to the investment group Stratosfera.

Stratosfera, which the ACF links to Chachava, received loans and credits totaling 51,230,297,000 rubles ($594,765,305) in 2024. Investigators compared this amount to the financial filings of Russian companies and found an almost mirror-image transaction at JSC Optima, which the ACF identified as the company that provided the funds to Stratosfera. The ownership and financing chain went as follows: Optima → Stratosfera → Korporatsiya 42 → O23 → roughly 34% of Ozon.

The next link in the chain was established using Optima’s own filings. Optima received almost the same amount in the form of an interest-free loan from a company called Delta, which belongs to Gennady Timchenko, according to the investigation. The ACF also pointed to the ties between Optima’s staff and Putin’s inner circle: its current director, Darya Bryliakova, worked at organizations linked to the president’s nephew Mikhail Shelomov and to long-time Putin associate Yuri Kovalchuk; the previous director, Anastasia Yuldasheva, worked at Shelomov’s company Aktsept; and the chief accountant, Zhanna Tsapleva, previously worked at a company belonging to Svetlana Krivonogikh, the mother of Putin’s illegitimate daughter.

Based on these findings, the ACF concludes that the Ozon stake was acquired with Timchenko’s money.

Investigators describe Timchenko himself as one of the holders of Putin’s money. As the ACF has previously reported, structures linked to Timchenko financed the construction of Putin’s palace in Gelendzhik and covered his family’s expenses.

The investigation into Timchenko’s connection to Ozon was released after a series of Ukrainian attacks against the online retailer’s assets. Ukrainian drones first struck the marketplace’s logistics complex in Chapayevsk, Samara Region on Aug. 22. The following day, a strike hit a facility in Orenburg, and on the night of Aug. 24, drones struck Ozon warehouses in Dagestan, Adygea, Krasnodar Krai, and Stavropol Krai. Fires broke out at the facilities near Krasnodar and Makhachkala, and their operations were halted.

Then, on Aug. 24 Putin signed a decree allowing companies’ property to be placed under temporary state control if authorities determine that they are not adequately protecting critically important facilities, including against drones. The mechanism explicitly covers transport and logistics infrastructure facilities, among others. One of the stated grounds for imposing temporary control is “ineffective implementation of measures” to prevent drone attacks.

Three days later, the government set up a subcommission headed by First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov to assess the security of important facilities, oversee their restoration, and prepare measures to ensure the uninterrupted operation of certain industries. The government will be able to place a company’s property under temporary control based on little more than Putin’s instructions.

The explosion occurred around 10 a.m. near a Magnit foodstore on Kolpinskoye Highway. According to Fontanka’s preliminary information, a homemade explosive device went off inside the car. The outlet also writes that the blast “tore off” the couple’s legs. The official cause of the incident has not yet been established.

According to Shot, the vehicle that exploded was a Chinese Geely crossover. The blast occurred right after the driver started the engine, blowing out the rear window, tearing off the hood and rear bumper, and severely deforming the body of the car while scattering debris dozens of meters from the point of the blast.

The Telegram channel Ostorozhno, Novosti! reports, citing eyewitnesses, that nearby parked cars were also damaged in the attack. There is still no official information about the identity of the person killed or the circumstances of the explosion.

The Insider previously reported that following a series of assassination attempts targeting Russian military personnel and security officials, the Ministry of Internal Affairs ordered restrictions on courier parking near a number of its facilities. Specifically, a courier service working with the Zolotoe Yabloko cosmetics retailer received a demand not to park at 29 locations in Moscow and the Moscow Region. Most of the marked zones, The Insider established, are around government buildings and infrastructure including police stations, specialized traffic police battalions, vehicle depots, and warehouses.

The restrictions also separately listed three addresses that were not on the map: the central office of the Investigative Committee, a business center in Khimki that was named in a U.S. Justice Department indictment as the location of GRU military unit 74455, and a Defense Ministry residential complex for service members.

While the reason for the restrictions was not directly stated in the mailing, the measures were introduced following a series of assassination attempts targeting Russian military personnel and security officials in which explosive devices were hidden in objects outwardly associated with courier delivery — such as boxes, kick scooters, and electric scooters.

According to Atvira Klaipėda, Sudheimer transferred all shares in SCT Lubricants to Suleimanova at least a week ago. He had been the company’s sole shareholder since September 2022 (and also in the period from 2013 to 2015). The company employs 167 people and operates a plant in Klaipėda that produces oils under the Mannol brand. In 2025, SCT Lubricants posted revenue of €205 million and net profit of €41.9 million.

Suleimanova was already linked to the SCT brand before her acquisition of the Lithuanian plant, The Insider has found. According to the official bulletin of Spain’s Commercial Registry, she was appointed sole administrator of SCT Lubricants Iberica SL in July 2021, succeeding Roman Pasemko Polovych in the post.

This past July, The Insider and Siena established that SCT Lubricants had directly supplied lubricating oils produced in Klaipėda to Russia up until January 2023. The recipient was the Kirov-based company JSC NLK, whose beneficiary was none other than Sudheimer himself.

Moreover, products from companies linked to Sudheimer continued arriving in Russia via the UAE and other countries. According to customs data, in 2024 more than 1,000 metric tons of oils made by SCT Chemicals FZE were imported into Russia from the UAE, and another 550 tons followed in the first quarter of 2025. In addition, hundreds of tons of SCT products were supplied by Dubai-based Chempioil FZE, which is also linked to Sudheimer.

In April 2026, SCT Chemicals FZE was placed under EU sanctions. The EU stated that the company’s specialized lubricants are being used by the Kolomna Plant near Moscow, an enterprise that supplies the Russian Defense Ministry with diesel engines for the Navy and has been under EU sanctions since December 2023.

Juri Sudheimer previously confirmed to The Insider and Siena his connection to SCT Chemicals FZE and Chempioil FZE, but he denied violating Lithuanian and EU law. He claimed that after the relevant ban was introduced, his companies did not ship Lithuanian products to Russia, and he stated his intention to challenge the sanctions that had been levied against SCT Chemicals FZE.

Before the war began in late February, Qatar accounted for around 20% of global LNG exports. However, since March, the country has managed to ship just 18 LNG cargoes, compared with 509 during the same period in 2025. According to Reuters’ estimate, Qatar has lost around $24 billion.

As Andreas Schröder, head of gas analytics at ICIS, told The Insider, EU countries are likely to enter the heating season with a gas deficit. Total storage inventories are expected to be 5.7 billion cubic meters below target.

“The forecast is based on the assumption that the Strait of Hormuz will remain closed until March 2027, but the actual duration of the blockade is unknown. This leaves market participants having to make educated guesses. At present, it appears that markets are increasingly pricing in a scenario of a longer closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

Replacing Qatari LNG with alternative supplies to Europe will be difficult. Between March and July 2025, Europe accounted for 67% of U.S. LNG exports. However, during the same period in 2026, that share fell to 51%. At the same time, East Asia’s share (China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan) of U.S. supplies rose from 10% to 16%, while Asia’s overall share increased from 16% last summer to 29% this summer.

ICIS has revised its base-case scenario for its gas forecast for Western and Central Europe (12 countries): the peak storage level has been lowered from 81% to 75%, reflecting weak injection rates in 2026. Under the updated base case, storage inventories will peak at approximately 5.7 billion cubic meters lower and six days earlier. An 80% level remains achievable, but only with a more favorable balance of supply and demand.

Countries with substantially lower average storage levels in Q2 2026 than in Q2 2025 will enter the winter with a deficit. Lower starting inventories ahead of winter increase Europe’s vulnerability to competition for LNG, cold snaps, and supply disruptions.

The prolonged absence of Qatari LNG is having a significant impact on European gas prices, which will be felt throughout the winter of 2026/2027. According to the ICIS forecast, as efforts to fill storage facilities intensify in the autumn, European gas prices could rise to €80/MWh, compared with the current level of €64–68/MWh. A year ago, gas prices were half as high, at €31–32/MWh.”

Natasha Fielding, a manager at the price reporting agency Argus Media, told The Insider that EU gas storage facilities are currently 63% full, compared with a five-year average of 81%.

“With gas stocks lower than usual, Europe will have to rely more heavily on LNG imports during the winter and may be forced to compete more aggressively with Asian buyers for available cargoes.

There is limited scope in the European gas market to significantly increase domestic production or pipeline imports to make up for the shortfall in Qatari LNG supplies. However, the recent expansion of LNG export capacity in North America is helping to partially offset the loss of supplies from the Persian Gulf.

The risk of gas consumption restrictions being introduced in Europe affecting households, the power sector, or critical industries, is low. However, gas demand could fall as a result of high prices. Higher electricity bills are encouraging households to save energy and could lead to reduced production in gas-intensive industries, prompting utilities to generate electricity from coal instead of gas.”

In early August, Reuters reported that natural gas inventories in European storage facilities had fallen to their lowest levels since records began in 2011. At the beginning of August, storage facilities were less than 58% full, 12 percentage points below the level recorded during the same period a year earlier.

In Germany, a regional government cannot directly influence the nation’s foreign or defense policy. This is the exclusive prerogative of the federal center, in the form of the Bundestag and the government. That said, the AfD makes no secret of its opposition to weapons deliveries to Ukraine and to broader European rearmament plans. The party describes Berlin’s actions as a “course toward war” and demands “the restoration of partnership with Russia.”

Even if a party representative were to take the premier’s seat in Magdeburg, they would be unable to change Germany’s current geopolitical course. Moreover, the authors of Germany’s Basic Law anticipated the possibility of conflict between the federal center and a state, embedding protective mechanisms in two separate articles.

Article 37 allows the federal government to apply coercive measures in the event that local authorities refuse to follow a national decision. Additionally under Article 85, the federal government may issue direct instructions to the states within the framework of so-called “federal supervision.” But the process isn’t simple.

If an event in Europe were to trigger NATO’s Article 5 mechanism, Germany’s civilian authorities and military would begin implementing the Operational Plan for Germany (OPLAN DEU) — a set of mobilization and logistics measures that include the redeployment of large military contingents and equipment from western and southern Europe to the east, and Berlin’s allies would be counting on the use of German territory as a key hub for defensive operations. Although the exact routes for convoy movements are classified, several factors suggest that Saxony-Anhalt has been assigned an important role in such plans.

First, the geographic location of the state is perfect, as it sits halfway between the western part of the country and Poland. As a result, virtually the only route for a rapid response runs through Saxony-Anhalt. After all, numerous key Bundeswehr bases and logistics centers are located in and around the state.

Second, this region has in recent years undergone large-scale rehabilitation of its rail network, autobahns, and secondary roads. Many of them are now considered to be among the best in Germany. Plans through 2029 call for further modernization of the central rail hubs in Magdeburg and Dessau, as well as capacity expansion on the Magdeburg–Berlin route.

A state government, if it chooses, could significantly slow down military convoy movements at precisely the moment when every hour counts. For example, a hypothetical premier of Saxony-Anhalt who opposes “escalation” and calls for “seeking compromises at the negotiating table” could refuse to issue the permits required for heavy — and especially tracked — military vehicles to pass through the region, as the issuance of such permits falls within the competence of the relevant state authority. In addition, military convoys are required to move exclusively with a police escort whose purpose is to close off civilian traffic, and law enforcement agencies are subordinate to local authority. 

A state government could significantly slow down military convoy movements at the very moment when every hour counts

Finally, decisions about the use of regional infrastructure — such as allocating land for tent camps and ensuring supplies of electricity, water, and fuel — are made locally, not at the federal center. Even the exchange of information between central command structures and the operations hub in Magdeburg could be significantly hampered.

There is no doubt that in an emergency, Berlin would immediately invoke its powers under the relevant articles of the Basic Law, and it is also fair to assume that not every senior police officer would agree to openly sabotage defensive measures. But precious hours — or even days — could still be lost, creating grave ramifications for the defensive strategy of both Germany individually and NATO as a whole.

Red tape as a weapon

The reputation of German bureaucracy is renowned far beyond the country’s borders. On one hand, the meticulous observance of the letter of the law and strict adherence to procedure guarantee a functioning rule-of-law state, reducing the actual power of those in positions of authority.

On the other hand, what makes the system stable simultaneously renders it vulnerable to legalistically legitimate, functionally pointless legal challenges. Although the AfD’s core political demands are unachievable without the approval of the Bundestag and the federal government, authorities at the state level possess all of the necessary mechanisms to make life considerably more difficult for the chancellor and their ruling coalition in Berlin.

A state is a significant player on Germany’s political field. The Bundesrat, the chamber of the states, approves nearly 40% of the laws passed by the Bundestag — and that approval is far from automatic. Since the Federal Republic’s founding in 1949, the Bundesrat veto has been used more than 100 times.

Moreover, some initiatives approved by the government and the upper house of parliament — such as recent payments to the public that required co-financing from the states — were never unblocked. And even though Saxony-Anhalt has only four of the Bundesrat’s 69 seats, this by no means implies legal weakness.

Presently, AfD parliamentary groups in the Bundestag and the state parliaments frequently pressure the executive and legislative branches with a barrage of motions, bills, and inquiries. These often lack any legal basis, but the system is obliged to respond to them.

For the AfD, this is an opportunity to demonstrate activity to its voters and convince them of its own effectiveness as the “only genuine opposition.” Moreover, around 7,000 AfD inquiries concerning the state of critical infrastructure and the country’s defense between 2020 and 2025 raise serious concerns among politicians and journalists.

Armed with votes in the Bundesrat and a new lever of influence, the AfD could well push this process to the point of absurdity, creating tangible stress for government administration. A state is what is known as a “constitutional body,” meaning it has the right to file a complaint with the Federal Constitutional Court. Under the unwritten rules of the game, a state government hardly ever resorts to this instrument — only in cases where the state’s rights have been seriously violated and numerous mediation councils with the federal center have yielded no result.

Statistically, state lawsuits account for just 1% of all cases examined by the Constitutional Court, and referrals to the court to review the legality of a given federal law are almost as rare — in the range of two to three per year. However, there are no legal limitations on the number referrals that can be submitted, meaning that a state under AfD rule could well disregard the unwritten rules and flood the Constitutional Court with challenges to any law passed by the Bundestag. The focus would be, first and foremost, on the issues most sensitive to a radical electorate: the entry and residence of foreign nationals, refugee admissions, environmental policy, and funding for renewable energy development, gender equality programs, and measures to strengthen European unity.

A state under AfD rule could flood the Constitutional Court with challenges to any law passed by the Bundestag

Blocking tax legislation would also theoretically be possible, posing a potential threat to the smooth functioning of the country’s fiscal system. Admittedly, federal laws are not subject to suspensive effect — meaning their entry into force would not be suspended on account of a pending complaint. Still, a mass attack on the Constitutional Court would inevitably affect its productivity and, indirectly, the functioning of government bodies.

A state also has the right to file a so-called urgent application, which would indeed effectively block a law until a final decision is reached. As a rule, the Constitutional Court grants such an application only in exceptional cases of serious harm to the state and its residents, but here there is ample room for legal interpretation and hairsplitting.

Finally, while four seats in the Bundesrat represent a mere 3% of the total membership, even these could become a “golden share” under certain conditions. The AfD’s appearance in the Bundesrat as the ruling party in its state would further legitimize the far-right party, and in the event of a serious conflict between states or a deadlock in the body, one side might not be able to resist the temptation to form a temporary alliance with the AfD in order to secure victory in the dispute with the help of Saxony-Anhalt’s votes.  

Reshaping the system

The intense focus of foreign — and indeed many German — observers exclusively on federal politics is understandable. The state level may seem dull and unimportant, but in Germany’s federalist model the region plays a significant role in the implementation of policy. The state commands numerous levers of government administration, and here, the AfD would obtain tangible opportunities to change a great deal if it were to come to power.

All school-level education, along with a significant share of higher education, is a state-level responsibility. In Germany, a teacher is not required to follow the textbook to the letter and enjoys considerable freedom in shaping lesson concepts, but a hypothetical AfD-led government in Saxony-Anhalt would be quite capable of reformatting the educational process.

The party’s attention is focused primarily on the subject of “history,” and it makes no secret of its rejection of the form of historical memory and perception of past events that has developed in the Federal Republic. Instead, it would prefer a departure from the sense of guilt — or more precisely, collective responsibility — of the German people for the crimes of Nazism, as well as from the negative assessment of the militarism of the Second Reich, the colonial period, and a number of historical figures from the last 150 years.

Ideally, the AfD wants to foster the development of German patriots who are proud of their country and do not dwell on the dark pages of its history. This approach could be reflected in new curricula, which teachers are not entitled to ignore.

The AfD wants to raise German patriots who are proud of their country and do not dwell on the dark pages of its history

The state Ministry of Education would also be able to exert sufficient administrative and financial pressure on schools and universities to shut down initiatives aimed at combating racism, xenophobia, homophobia, and sexism. The AfD has an extremely negative attitude toward gender equality and diversity, feminism, and the use of gender-neutral language, meaning all of these could become a thing of the past in the area under its authority.

Admittedly, under such a scenario, the human factor would play a considerable role. Would thousands of teachers, officials, and administrators be willing to comply with the new rules of the game? This is where the second important set of state-level powers comes into play: personnel policy. Saxony-Anhalt has approximately 115,000 public-sector employees — 12% of the entire working-age population — and in a region with high unemployment, low wages, and very poor prospects on the open labor market, some administrators may choose to adapt to the new realities rather than risk being dismissed. In the five years before the next elections, the AfD could well appoint “ideologically compatible” personnel to senior and mid-level positions. This also applies to the state Center for Political Education, an important government body promoting democracy, which the new government could restructure beyond recognition.

Finally, the state government controls the police and the Office for the Protection of the Constitution — the body that, back in November of 2023, classified the AfD’s state organization in Saxony-Anhalt as “definitively right-wing extremis.” Should the AfD come to power, it may be tempted to exact revenge on the agency. Meanwhile, the state police have already been mired in scandals on multiple occasions involving the discovery of racist and antisemitic messages in internal chats, while year after year, human rights activists record an increase in cases of police brutality.

Even worse, it is not inconceivable that some local police officers would welcome “a firm hand” in power. In addition, the state Interior Minister has the authority to block individual law enforcement operations, and a hypothetical AfD minister would undoubtedly make use of that privilege.

Not least, the emergence of an AfD-led government even at the state level would deal a crushing blow to the firewall. Germany’s Basic Law explicitly requires the states to cooperate with one another. Without this, German federalism would simply be unworkable. In practice, the regions are genuinely bound by political ties — from the Bundesrat, where the mode of cooperation is different from that in the neighboring chamber of parliament, to the format of joint conferences of relevant state ministers. Currently, such conferences are held in 21 areas — from meetings of state premiers to forums of interior, economics, justice and transport ministers.

The AfD’s rise to power in Saxony-Anhalt could provide the final contribution to the “normalization” of the far-right party on a wider scale. 

Alex Karp, CEO of the U.S. tech giant Palantir, personally visited Kyiv in June 2022, becoming one of the first major Western IT company heads to travel to the Ukrainian capital after the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion. The two sides later held repeated meetings both in Ukraine and at international venues to discuss cooperation in defense technology and artificial intelligence.

Palantir executives and employees continue to regularly visit Ukraine. The company also has a small team of local specialists on the ground in Kyiv who adapt Palantir software to front-line needs and serve as a link between the company and Ukrainian government agencies.

Founded in 2003, Palantir is one of the key players in the global defense tech sector. It specializes in analyzing large amounts of data and creating software for the government agencies, intelligence services, and militaries of many countries. In the U.S. alone, its major clients include the CIA, the FBI, the Pentagon, the Air Force, the Marine Corps, and Special Operations Command.

Palantir’s technologies are also used by the British army and Israel and have been tested by militaries in Japan, Norway, and Denmark. After the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, Ukrainian ministries joined that list, including the Ministry of Digital Transformation, the Ministry of Education and Science, the Ministry of Economy, and the Ministry of Defense.

For Palantir Ukraine has effectively become its largest testing ground for military AI development under the conditions of modern combat.

“For us, this is the next step in developing win-win cooperation. Partners get the opportunity to train their AI models on real data from a modern war, while Ukraine gets faster development of autonomous systems and new technological solutions for the front,” then-Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said after meeting Karp in May 2026.

Ukraine has effectively become the largest testing ground for military AI development under the conditions of a modern conflict

As early as 2023, Fedorov, who was then Ukraine’s Minister of Digital Transformation, described Kyiv’s joint work with Palantir to develop technology capable of analyzing large volumes of data and turning them into easily digestible information for ministries, government agencies, and the public. In 2023 and 2024, Ukraine and Palantir worked together on demining projects and initiatives aimed at the safe return to classrooms of children who had been forced into online learning because of Russian aerial attacks.

Time magazine reported in early 2024 that the Ukrainian military had begun using Palantir-developed technology to analyze vast amounts of intelligence data and plan its combat operations. In modern war, information flows through dozens of systems that often cannot share data quickly, leaving commanders waiting hours or even days to act, and Palantir’s technologies shorten that gap. The company’s platforms allow data from satellites, drones, and other surveillance systems to be processed in a single environment, enabling commanders and analysts to assess developing situations more quickly. Palantir software gives the military a more complete picture of events on a specific section of the front in near real time.

Palantir gives the Ukrainian military a more complete picture of events on the battlefield in near real time

One of Palantir’s best-known products is Gotham, a platform designed for military and intelligence agencies. The decision-making system gathers data from satellites, sensors, radar, bank transactions, and social media, then identifies links between events, objects, and people. For example, it can help spot connections between the movement of equipment, satellite images, and intelligence reports that at first glance appear unrelated.

Gotham is described as an “AI-powered kill chain,” allowing users to task sensors to quickly detect a target and select a means of striking it — either automatically or manually. In other words, it can find the proverbial “needle in a haystack,” then remove it.

An AI expert who asked to remain anonymous told The Insider that the platform looks like Palantir’s answer to the concept of network-centric warfare and its technical embodiment for a potential conflict with China, embodying the doctrine of Joint All-Domain Command and Control, as well as the principle of “any sensor, any decider, any shooter.”

A Gotham demonstration video on Palantir’s website briefly shows a battlefield in Ukraine, along with icons that may represent military units and an AI-detected target. It is unclear whether the footage reflects Gotham’s use by Ukraine’s armed forces or is a visualization based on collected data.

Fedorov has not directly said that Ukraine’s defense forces use Gotham, but he has noted that Palantir systems are used to analyze and plan long-range strikes deep inside Russia. Since March 2026, Ukrainian forces have regularly reported (1, 2, 3) hitting strategic Russian targets located 1,500 to 2,000 kilometers from the front line.

In May 2026, a CNN report on Ukrainian forces’ use of unmanned ground and air systems revealed the existence of an intelligence and analytical software platform called PRISMA. The name of the platform is not spoken in the video, but in several shots, maps with tactical overlays can be seen in the background with PRISMA written in the upper left-hand corner.

Ukraine’s military intelligence agency (HUR) uses PRISMA for long-range drone operations. The platform brings together real-time maps, flight paths, and AI-processed data. It is capable of coordinating large numbers of drones.

The system analyzes data from previous missions — interception points, radar coverage zones, air defense activity and routes used by previous waves of drones — and uses that information to identify vulnerabilities in Russia’s air defense system and calculate alternative routes. PRISMA can process thousands of routes at once.

The CNN report also described a distributed command network, meaning that the loss of one node does not derail an entire operation. The pro-war Russian Telegram channel Arkhangel Spetsnaza (lit. “Archangel of the Special Forces”) has suggested that PRISMA is a layer built on top of Gotham, with AI algorithms adapted for the specific demands of mass raids involving dozens of drones.

For work with satellite data, Palantir developed MetaConstellation, a system that makes it possible to combine data from different satellites and quickly obtain images of a required area. With MetaConstellation, the military can quickly obtain up-to-date information about equipment movements, fortification construction, or changes on the battlefield. The Ukrainian military uses the system to integrate satellite data for reconnaissance and targeting.

Foundry is another major Palantir platform. It serves a similar function to Gotham but is designed for civilian use, acting as an AI layer that connects fragmented systems, data, processes, models, and decisions.

The platform’s users include government agencies, major corporations, and banks. In Ukraine, the Economy Ministry uses Foundry to analyze humanitarian, economic, and geographic factors in order to prioritize areas for demining efforts, while the Education Ministry uses the platform to collect and analyze data on the safety of educational institutions across Ukraine. Foundry helps create safe spaces for students, design networks of shelters, and ensure schools keep operating during wartime.

Large language models are also being used in military operations. They can process vast amounts of information, prioritize data from multiple sources, and turn a chaotic flow of intelligence into clear, high-level summaries for decision-makers.

A key part of Palantir’s ecosystem is its Artificial Intelligence Platform (AIP), which integrates large language models and other AI tools directly into military, government, and business workflows. The platform functions as a generative AI layer broadly similar to that of a chatbot: an operator asks a question, then the platform processes the request and proposes several possible courses of action, along with a forecast of the likely outcome. Palantir says AIP helps analyze large datasets, automate some analytical work, and speed up decision-making.

Another project, Brave1 Dataroom, is a secure platform created with Palantir that gives Ukrainian developers access to real battlefield datasets in order to better train AI models. Fedorov said after meeting Karp on May 12 that more than 100 companies were using the platform to train upwards of 80 models to detect and intercept aerial targets in difficult conditions.

Eric Schmidt’s AI-enabled unmanned systems

Palantir helps collect, process, and analyze large amounts of data, but even the most accurate information must be put towards concrete action if it is to have a meaningful effect on the battlefield. Unmanned systems using artificial intelligence do exactly this.

Ukraine and Russia have entered a race to develop and deploy automated systems, from unmanned aerial vehicles to ground and naval platforms. Much of those efforts center on creating systems that can sustain operations under conditions of intense electronic warfare. Schmidt, the former Google CEO, believes the future of war will be defined by autonomous systems and the mass use of drones.

Google’s former CEO believes the future of war will be defined by autonomous systems and the mass use of drones

Schmidt led Google from 2001 to 2011, turning the company into one of the world’s leading technology firms. He later held leadership and advisory roles in the fields of defense technology and artificial intelligence, chairing the Defense Innovation Board at the U.S. Department of Defense and the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence.

After the start of Russia’s full-scale war, Schmidt repeatedly visited Ukraine, met with representatives of the country’s technology sector and defense industry, and said the war had become one of the main catalysts for the development of autonomous systems.

Schmidt’s Perennial Autonomy specializes in next-generation unmanned systems that combine robotics, machine vision, and artificial intelligence. Its goal is to gradually reduce drones’ dependence on operators by increasing their level of autonomy.

Unlike many traditional defense companies, the focus of Perennial Autonomy is not on creating individual weapons systems but on combining software and artificial intelligence with the mass production of drones. Schmidt argues that large networks of cheap autonomous platforms capable of quickly adapting to battlefield changes through AI will play an increasingly important role in war going forward.

Among Perennial Autonomy’s best-known systems are the Merops interceptor drone, which has proved effective against Shahed-type drones, and the medium-range Hornet kamikaze drone, which became known thanks to Ukraine’s strike campaign against the “land corridor” connecting mainland Russia to annexed Crimea. Both systems use elements of AI to strike targets.

One of Perennial Autonomy’s key technologies is autonomous drone control. Traditional FPV drones — first-person-view drones controlled through a live video feed — are entirely dependent on an operator steering the flight in real time. Autonomous UAVs, by contrast, use software algorithms that allow the drone to carry out some tasks independently, eliminating the need for constant human intervention.

Such drones can automatically follow a set route, hold a course, track a target, or complete a mission even if the link to the operator is lost. Autonomy is especially important in modern war, where electronic warfare, or EW, often disrupts drone control channels.

Schmidt advocates using large numbers of cheap drones instead of a limited number of expensive platforms. The idea is that the loss of individual drones is not critical provided that the system can quickly replace them.

That approach has proved effective in Ukraine. The mass use of FPV drones has shown that even relatively inexpensive systems can create serious problems for much more costly enemy equipment. The Hornet drone, for example, costs $10,000 to $11,000, while the targets it strikes are often worth orders of magnitude more.

Another important area is machine vision technology, one of the basic technologies involved in the development of autonomous strike drones and interceptor drones. In the case of the Hornet, this takes the form of an electro-optical guidance system. In flight, its AI processes the camera image, comparing reference images of equipment with whatever the lens is showing at that moment.

The neural network can focus on details: size, the black license plates used by the Russian military, the tracks left behind by vehicles, V and Z markings, and other small features. Based on those details, the drone determines the target’s priority and offers options to the operator, who then only has to confirm the suggested choice.

The neural network can focus on details including size, the black license plates used by the military, tracks, and V and Z markings

Autonomous systems also use AI algorithms for navigation and orientation. Such technologies allow a drone to analyze its surroundings, avoid obstacles, adjust its route, and adapt to changes in the environment — all while carrying out a mission.

Combining AI with data from cameras, sensors, and navigation systems creates the basis for more independent operation of unmanned platforms. A key feature of the Hornet UAV is its combination of satellite navigation and inertial-optical navigation. If the satellite signal is lost, the aircraft can still determine its position using images of the terrain.

A similar navigation principle was used by NASA’s Ingenuity, the first Mars helicopter. Because Mars has no satellite navigation system, the aircraft oriented itself using images of the surface below. Drones using a similar navigation principle have been nicknamed “Martians.”

An important technological challenge involves ensuring drones can operate under conditions of active electronic warfare, which suppresses control signals, data transmission, and satellite navigation. Cameras and lenses allow Hornet drones to lock onto targets from an average distance of 300 to 500 meters, allowing the UAV to dive autonomously onto a target from an altitude of 200 to 300 meters or to strike a target from roughly the same distance while flying at low altitude.

In that mode, most vehicle-mounted EW systems become ineffective. If a Hornet loses contact with its base, it does not abort the operation; instead, the drone selects a target and attacks it on its own, making it nearly insensitive to electronic warfare systems.

One of the technologies Schmidt’s company is working on is anti-aircraft UAVs. Its Merops system combines a high-speed platform, computer vision, and guidance algorithms that allow it to detect, track, and destroy aerial targets. Traditional air defense was designed mainly to counter aircraft and missiles, but the mass use of drones has forced militaries to look for new approaches. Anti-aircraft drones are a cheaper alternative to using expensive surface-to-air missiles against mass drone attacks, and interceptor drones have become part of a new layered air defense system.

The initiative showed rapid growth during Fedorov’s brief tenure as Ukraine’s defense minister. As part of the Ukrainian army’s announced technological transformation, Ukraine’s Air Force managed to increase the interception rate for Shahed drones from 83% to 91% in just six months.

Notably, immediately after Fedorov resigned as defense minister, Karp invited him to take part in a joint project, and Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto offered him an adviser’s post. Fedorov, however, decided to remain in Ukraine to work on technology that he believes can change the nature of modern combat.

In addition to software and artificial intelligence, scaling production has become an important part of Perennial Autonomy’s approach. Modern war has shown that the effectiveness of unmanned systems depends not only on their specifications but also on manufacturers’ ability to quickly produce them in large quantities.

If Palantir helps Ukraine work with data more effectively, Perennial Autonomy is trying to solve another problem: how to quickly turn that data into a real battlefield advantage. That is why cooperation between Ukraine and Schmidt’s company is not limited to supplying individual drones — it is a long-term partnership in the production, development, and deployment of new defense technologies.

Ukraine has effectively become one of the world’s main centers for the development of military drones. No laboratory or test range can reproduce conditions like those on a real front, as developers receive constant feedback from troops using autonomous control algorithms, computer vision systems, and anti-EW solutions directly in combat.

In March 2026, Fedorov said the Defense Ministry was giving its corporate partners access to real battlefield data in order to better train their AI models. The result, he said, would benefit both sides: Ukraine receives access to new technology, while Schmidt’s company can improve its systems more quickly.

Ukraine’s Delta battlefield management ecosystem

Meanwhile, Ukraine is actively developing its own systems capable of competing with global counterparts. According to Alex Karp, Ukrainian developers have created one of the most advanced and adaptive battlefield targeting systems in the world. Part of it was built with support from Palantir, but it was developed largely by Ukrainian engineers and military personnel.

The Palantir CEO sees battlefield management systems as Ukraine’s main technological asset — and, importantly, as a unique export product. Ukraine’s Delta system integrates information about enemy forces from different sources and is used both to coordinate unmanned systems and support infantry operations, allowing Ukrainian troops to use a smartphone or tablet to watch what is happening on the front line in real time, and foreign military officials have noticed. In May 2026, U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll called the system “absolutely incredible,” noting that it “fully integrates every drone, every sensor, every strike platform into a single network.”

Delta is an entire ecosystem, with its own messenger, cloud storage, and even an internal marketplace where units exchange electronic points in order to procure drones, communications equipment, electronic warfare systems, and other necessary gear.

Development of the system began in 2016. Today, work on it continues at the Center for Innovation and Defense Technologies Development of Ukraine’s Defense Ministry. Delta consists of several connected modules: the interactive Delta Monitor map displays the positions of Ukrainian and Russian forces in real time, Vezha (lit. “tower”)collects video feeds from Ukrainian UAVs and analyzes them using AI, Target Hub distributes targets among neighboring units, and  Mission Control combines data on the activities of drone crews (including drone types, launch sites, routes, and assigned tasks).

Data gathered in Delta is used not only directly on the battlefield, but also to develop new AI systems, such as the Avengers Labs platform from the Center for Innovation and Defense Technologies Development.

Unlike Brave1 Dataroom, which is focused primarily on developing AI to detect and intercept aerial targets, Avengers Labs is designed to train models on a much broader range of battlefield data. In August, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said Ukrainian defense companies had received access to the platform, which contains around 5 million annotated frames, mostly obtained from the Delta ecosystem. They cover a wide range of targets, including tanks, artillery, air defense systems, individual infantry soldiers, and strike and reconnaissance drones. Companies can use this real combat data to train their own AI models without receiving direct access to sensitive information. Such models are expected to be used, among other things, for automatic target recognition and autonomous drone guidance.

AI in future military conflicts

In March 2026, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry launched the Defense AI Center A1 for battlefield analysis and technology, which then-Defense Minister Fedorov said would “help turn combat experience and front-line data into technological solutions more quickly and accelerate the introduction of innovation into the troops.” The center’s main tasks involve analyzing combat data, forecasting enemy actions, developing autonomous systems, and creating new command-and-control tools.

According to the center’s head, Danylo Tsvok, artificial intelligence is already helping Ukraine hold territory and reduce risks to soldiers as they confront a larger and better-resourced enemy. As the technology develops, AI could become the foundation of a single digital battlefield in which intelligent weapons systems act in coordination, relying on a shared platform for command and battlefield analysis.

“This could happen within three to five years,” Tsvok said. “Within that timeframe, the front line could be protected by tightly integrated hardware and software systems.”

Artificial intelligence is already helping Ukraine hold territory while reducing risks to soldiers

Fedorov believes that, given the nature of modern warfare, Ukraine must “defeat Russia in every technological cycle, and artificial intelligence is one of the key areas of this competition.”

“The world needs security, and only autonomous weapons can provide it,” the former minister said. “This is the new nuclear weapon. Countries that have it will be protected.”

Eric Schmidt believes that in future military conflicts, the front line will become a digital-age version of the “no man’s land” famous from World War I — an area where sensors and drones will make it possible to strike everything that moves.

Schmidt believes combat AI systems will become increasingly autonomous — humans will transition from controlling every shot to merely exercising broad supervision, intervening only when necessary. Two primary factors are driving that shift: the regular loss of contact with drones because of electronic warfare and the battlefield advantage held by more autonomous systems over those in which every use of force requires operator confirmation.

Schmidt believes this logic, like the chemical weapons race in World War I, could push states toward the mass adoption of autonomous combat AI systems, even if they initially would have preferred stricter limits on the use of such technologies.

Combat AI systems will become increasingly autonomous

Modern war has changed radically: the mass use of cheap drones is proving more effective than a limited number of expensive weapons systems. But the armies and defense industries of many countries, including the United States, continue preparing for past conflicts, relying on costly and complex platforms even as the experience of the war in Ukraine shows the effectiveness of different approaches. A massive revolution in military affairs is underway, but political and military leaders have not yet adapted to the new conditions, Schmidt stresses.

Whether the pace of Ukraine’s technological transformation will continue after Fedorov’s departure from the government remains an open question. According to a Conflict Intelligence Team (CIT) expert who asked to remain anonymous, many of the reforms that are already underway have enough momentum to continue. But at the same time, the expert said, many initiatives were closely tied to Fedorov’s personal role — his professional contacts, his talent for building effective teams, and his ability to secure support for projects at various levels.

The expert also pointed to other personnel changes, including the departure of Pavlo Yelizarov as deputy commander of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, which could slow some projects or lead to their cancellation. Still, the expert emphasized that it is too early to draw firm conclusions. Much will depend on the final makeup of the new leadership at Ukraine’s Defense Ministry and the priorities set by the new minister.

Military analyst Kirill Mikhailov takes a different view. He believes the technological transformation of Ukraine’s defense sector has already become irreversible and is unlikely to be stopped by personnel reshuffles. At the same time, he links the future of battlefield AI primarily to expanding commanders’ ability to analyze the situation and make decisions. As Mikhailov notes, modern AI systems can be more effective in command-support roles than some staff officers.

“They’re at risk of losing their business and their housing and being left with enormous debt on the two vehicles Artem used for his business. He supported the family and paid taxes. On top of that, he faces a serious risk of deportation. If you have a court date set in your state, you wait for the court’s decision. If no court date has been set and you get detained, you’ll be tried in detention, where there’s a huge chance of being denied asylum and ordered deported.

The couple has residency in New Jersey. Their case was built around Olga’s asylum claim as an antiwar activist. No court date has been set for them in New Jersey yet. Olga has been waiting this whole time for an interview call, which hasn’t been scheduled either. In effect, Artem has been taken hostage. If a court date is now set at the detention facility, they will most likely be deported. We are raising money for a lawyer to file a petition for Artem to be released on bail in order to save him from imminent deportation.”

Kosolapov was detained on Aug. 23 while driving a minivan carrying a commercial load. After his documents were checked, the Russian was detained and initially sent to an immigration detention facility in Louisiana. As Vlasov clarified, the facility in that state turned out to be overcrowded, and Artem was transferred to another one.

The family came to the U.S. on visas in 2022 and filed for asylum. Olga is an antiwar activist who has taken part in protests in support of Ukraine and volunteered to help Ukrainians. Artem also took part in the protests. Olga is now alone at home with their infant child. She is not currently working; Artem had been the sole breadwinner.

In July, U.S. authorities detained a record number of immigrants — nearly 50,000 people. The month also set a record for deportations, almost 34,000. Lawyers and human rights advocates note that the Trump administration has changed its approach to detaining non-citizens: whereas an arrest was formerly carried out by a group of 10–12 ICE officers, now a pair of police officers simply pull a car over on the road and detain the driver. As a result, bystanders often find it hard to tell whether a police officer is conducting a routine vehicle check or carrying out an immigration arrest. This is exactly how Artem Kosolapov was detained.

The Insider examined railway freight data for August 2025 through February 2026 and determined the balance between Russia's production and consumption of explosives and explosive materials.

What is being shipped, and from where?

In railway reporting, everything related to explosives is classified as “explosive materials.” This includes both the chemical substances themselves – gunpowder and brisant explosives (trinitrotoluene, RDX, HMX) – and finished ammunition (cartridges, artillery charges, and artillery rounds).

The Insider has found out that from August 2025 through February 2026, a total of 59,000 tons of explosive materials were imported into Russia from the Far East, mostly through Nakhodka. Imported ammunition generally does not go directly to the war zone but is first sent to military warehouses in the rear. North Korea remains the most likely source of this cargo. The ammunition imported from North Korea consists of artillery rounds and charges, as well as KN-23 missiles.

North Korea remains the most likely source of explosive materials imported into Russia

Shipments of ammunition from North Korea to Russia were previously detected by a consortium of Western investigative outlets. In 2024, researchers at CSIS concluded, based on high-resolution satellite imagery, that around 2.5 million artillery rounds had been delivered to Russia by early 2024, mainly through the Far Eastern ports of Vostochny and Dunay. According to a 2025 investigation by the British NGO Open Source Centre, over the twenty months from August 2023 to March 2025,  between 4.2 million and 5.8 million rounds were imported into Russia.

According to estimates by South Korea’s intelligence service cited in the media, around 12 million rounds had been delivered from North Korea to Russia by July 2025 – roughly two to two and a half times the number estimated by the Open Source Centre. These reports provided no specific evidence beyond sources South Korean intelligence; as such, The Insider considers the Open Source Centre’s lower estimate to be the most accurate and best-substantiated figure for the period in question.

At the end of 2025, Vadym Skibitsky, deputy head of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, told Reuters that North Korea had run out of artillery shells. As a result, there were reportedly no deliveries at all in September 2025, and North Korea shifted to supplying drones instead. South Korean media also reported a sharp decline in ammunition deliveries in early 2026. However, The Insider’s investigation found that, judging by cargo descriptions and destinations — namely, artillery ammunition depots — shipments marked “explosive materials” were still being actively sent through the port of Nakhodka in 2026.

Who produces energetic materials and how?

To pinpoint the locations where energetic materials (brisant explosives, propellants and solid rocket fuels) are produced, one can follow the shipments of "civilian" reagents: nitric acid, concentrated sulphuric acid, nitration agent (mixture of nitric and sulphuric acid), toluene, urotropine, acetic acid, chlorates.

The freight data on these chemicals tell us that the manufacturing of energetic materials and products containing them is concentrated on a few plants. These include the Biysk Oleum Plant in Altai Krai, which, judging by its shipments, is likely producing large quantities of trinitrotoluene and smaller quantities of RDX; the Sverdlov Plant in Dzerzhinsk, Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, which is the leading producer of RDX in Russia and, according to its shipments, also produces some trinitrotoluene; and Promsintez in Chapayevsk, Samara Oblast, which primarily produces trinitrotoluene.

Nitric acid, oleum, nitration agent, and toluene are also received in large quantities by the Kazan and Tambov Gunpowder Plants, the Aleksin Chemical Plant, the Kamensky Chemical Combine, the Solikamsk Ural Plant, and the Avangard Plant in Sterlitamak. The Anozit plant in Kuibyshev, Novosibirsk Oblast, receives chlorates and produces ammonium perchlorate, a propellant used in solid-fuel rocket engines.

It all starts with nitric acid

The production of brisant explosives and gunpowder for military purposes is impossible without nitric acid.

The only two suppliers of nitric acid to Russia’s defense industry are EuroChem in Novomoskovsk (owned by Andrey Melnichenko, who recently made headlines with a widely discussed article in The Economist), and the Azot plant in Berezniki. Both facilities have been targeted by drone attacks, with the Novomoskovsk plant hit repeatedly.

Plants in Kazan, Dzerzhinsk, Chapayevsk, and Aleksin primarily receive nitric acid from Novomoskovsk, while the Biysk plant sources most of its supply from Berezniki. The Perm Gunpowder Plant, the Solikamsk plant, the Aleksin Chemical Combine, and Avangard receive a ready-made mixture of concentrated sulfuric and nitric acids used for nitration – directly from Berezniki.

Brisant explosives

Between August 2025 and February 2026 the Biysk Oleum Plant received 16,000 tons of toluene and 1,000 tons of urotropine. This points out to a intensive production of trinitrotoluene and to a launch of a new separate production line of RDX (which needs urotropine), thus breaking the Dzerzhinsk monopoly. 

During the same time, 3,000 tons of toluene were brought to Chapaevsk - apparently indicating production of trinitrotoluene. 

Beside the primary production of explosives, Russian explosives and ammunition plants apparently processed into finished ammunition 15,000 tons of explosive materials produced by their colleagues, from August 2025 to February 2026. This is seen from shipments that went from the Biysk Oleum Plant to the Sverdlov Plant in Dzerzhinsk and the Polymer plant in Chapayevsk.

Gunpowder

The output of the gunpowder makers – the Kazan, Perm, and Tambov Gunpowder Plants, the Aleksin Chemical Plant, and the Solikamsk Ural Plant – can be estimated judging by the amount of nitric acid and nitration agent they received. (The freight data also contain no information on deliveries of cellulose to these plants or deliveries from the plants to the military warehouses).

The total volume of explosives potentially produced  looks quite large compared with prewar levels. In the first half of 2019, for example, military plants received just 21,800 tons of nitric acid, including melange; in the second half of 2019, they received 24,500 tons. In the first half of 2020, the figure was 21,200 tons, and in the second half, 23,000 tons. 

It should be held in mind that the efficiency  of all technological processes in real life is less than 100% - for example because not all of nitric acid is regenerated or recuperated. According to experts in chemistry The Insider has talked to, a typical outcome efficiency  that can be expected in the Russian plants is around 90%. Hence the total production of gunpowder and brisant explosives between August 2025 and February 2026 was below 90,000 tons, or 154,000 tons per year.

Still, the production trend is clear even with this rough estimate. Annual nitric acid consumption by military plants now stands at 131,000 tons, compared with 44,200 tons per year before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Thus the intensity of operations at Russia’s gunpowder and brisant explosives plants has increased threefold on average. 

Where do the explosives go?

According to cargo movement data, 14,000 tons of explosives were shipped from warehouses and plants to civilian enterprises, mainly mining companies, between August 2026 and February 2027. This figure has changed little compared with the prewar period. In the second half of 2020, for example, mining companies received around 18,500 tons.

Some substances intended for military use are turned into finished products — i.e. ammunition — at the same plant where they are synthesized. Others are produced at one plant and only become part of a finished product at another.

For example, the Sverdlov Plant both synthesizes brisant explosives itself and receives 12,000 tons of explosive materials from Biysk to manufacture military products, while the "Plastmass" Plant in Kopeysk, the Novosibirsk Synthetic Fiber Plant, the Bryansk Chemical Plant named after the 50th Anniversary of the USSR, Polymer JSC, the Voskhod Far Eastern Production Association, the Kalinovsky Chemical Plant in Sverdlovsk Oblast, and the Amur Cartridge Plant all receive materials from Biysk.

A special case: solid rocket propellant

Guided missiles generally use solid-fuel rocket motors for boosters or sustainer engines. This is the case for the 57E6E missile used by the Pantsir-S1 air defense system, as well as missiles for the Buk, S-300, S-400, Iskander-M, Kinzhal, and Oniks systems, and the Topol, Bulava, and Yars intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Ammonium perchlorate is used as the oxidizer in solid rocket propellant. The only plant in Russia producing this substance for use as an oxidizer in solid rocket propellant is Anozit in Kuibyshev, Novosibirsk Oblast. According to available railway data, the only recipients of ammonium perchlorate in Russia are the Perm Gunpowder Plant and the "Kamensky Kombinat" plant. Anozit is the only supplier of ammonium perchlorate.

Ammonium perchlorate is relatively easy to produce from ammonium chlorate and sodium perchlorate. The latter, in turn, is produced from sodium chlorate, which is a widely used chemical employed in the pulp and paper industry for bleaching.

Solid rocket propellant is a special case in the explosives supply chain. The Insider examined Anozit’s shipments of bulk chemicals. According to cargo movement data, in January 2026 the plant received just four substances in large quantities: hydrochloric acid, ammonia, caustic soda, and sodium chlorate.

Anozit received sodium chlorate exclusively from the chlorine plant at the Ilim Group’s pulp and paper mill in Bratsk – several railcars a month. In total, Anozit received 1,600 tons of sodium chlorate during the period in question. The pulp and paper mill thus became a direct participant in military production.

The ammonium perchlorate produced by Anozit (4,200 tons) was sent primarily to the Perm Gunpowder Plant (3,300 tons), with the remainder going to the Kamensky Combine.

Who consumes the explosives?

Railway stations that consume explosive materials but are not themselves military plants can be divided into four groups:

Military warehouses

“Military” stations

“Mining” stations

Unidentifiable stations

Railway stations that can be clearly identified as directly serving the military consume 64,000 tons of explosives and ammunition.

As these data show, the largest volume of ammunition arrives at "Kavkaz" station for onward shipment to Crimea by ferry.

At the same time, the net balance for stations that could not be identified – and which may serve either military or civilian warehouses or enterprises – was virtually zero over the same period, as total traffic through destinations in this category amounted to only around 1,000 tons.

Military warehouses that could be clearly identified on Google Maps with storage buildings plainly visible, shipped 182,000 tons of ammunition by rail during period from August 2025 to February 2026, and received 189,000 tons. Their net balance – a total of 7,000 more tons received than shipped – therefore has little effect on the overall balance of explosive materials. However, these figures should be treated with caution, as initial shipments from military plants, whether to warehouses or directly to the front, appear to be classified.

Mining – that is, civilian enterprises and warehouses belonging to the mining industry – accounts for the consumption of around 14,000 tons of explosive materials.

Additionally, around 4,000 tons of explosives and ammunition were exported to Belarus, while the remaining imports and exports involving Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan were negligible

What was it like before the war?

In the second half of 2020, Russian plants sent to their customers around 40,000 tons of explosive materials. Imports were negligible, and the mining industry consumed 18,500 tons.

The output of gunpowder and brisant explosives plants was significantly lower before the war: their consumption of nitric acid, including melange, amounted to 21,000 tons over six months, compared with 76,500 tons between August 2025 and February 2026. This is also reflected in shipments from gunpowder plants, which apparently had not yet been concealed at the time. For example, the Kazan Gunpowder Plant shipped just 146 tons in the second half of 2020.

What does this tell us?

Russia’s main high-volume production chains for gunpowder and brisant explosives are not dependent on imports. At the same time, they are heavily concentrated among a small number of monopoly producers. All nitric acid supplied to military plants comes from Novomoskovsk and Berezniki. All TNT production is concentrated in Biysk, Dzerzhinsk, and Chapayevsk, and until recently, virtually all RDX was produced in Dzerzhinsk.

However, the bad news for Ukraine is that, judging by cargo movement data, Biysk has successfully brought its own RDX production online – a project that had previously only been announced. Dzerzhinsk has therefore lost its monopoly in this market.

Biysk has successfully brought its own RDX production online

Judging by nitric acid consumption at explosives plants, Russia has managed to increase explosives production roughly threefold since 2020. One possible explanation is that the only factor constraining further growth is the fact that production lines are already operating at full capacity – after all, much of the chemical-processing equipment used in Russia was, until recently, itself imported. 

Even with Russia’s chemical plants operating at such high capacity, North Korean assistance remains critical when it comes to the supply of artillery ammunition. The estimated North Korean shipments of 59,000 tons between August 2025 and February 2026 roughly correspond to the volume of ammunition being expended at the front – at least 64,000 tons over the same period. These deliveries allow Russia to avoid significantly depleting its own stockpiles. In fact, Russian ammunition depots show a positive balance (according to the incomplete data available). It appears that Russia’s explosives plants were heavily underutilized before the full-scale war.

Statements by Ukraine’s military intelligence agency at the end of last year asserted that North Korea’s stockpiles had long since been depleted and that Russia would have to return to self-sufficiency. However, as The Insider has established, this was not the case. North Korea continued to actively supply ammunition to Russia until this spring, with the shipments being sent to the war from the port of Nakhodka.

Russian forces are increasingly using ballistic missiles to strike Ukrainian cities and critical infrastructure. The main means of intercepting them remain U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems, but supplies of missiles for them are limited.

In 2026, Ukraine’s allies delivered just one-third as many air defense missiles as they had the previous year, and the global shortage of PAC-3 interceptors worsened significantly as a result of the war in the Middle East. As a result, Ukrainian commanders have had to choose which cities and facilities to prioritize for protection. Moreover, some attacks have seen ballistic missiles evade interception altogether (1, 2).

Even with the best of intentions, Ukraine’s allies are unlikely to be able to meaningfully increase their air defense supplies to Kyiv. A single modern PAC-3 interceptor costs an estimated $4–5 million, and production capacity is limited — as are stockpiles in European and U.S. arsenals. According to a CSIS estimate, as of July 2026 the U.S. had only around 800 PAC-3 missiles, and annual production comes in at about 650. Several missiles may be needed to reliably destroy a single target, meaning Ukraine sees its own ballistic missile programs not solely as offensive in nature but also as a means of countering the Russian missile threat by destroying launchers, ammunition depots, and the units that operate and service them.

Former Ukrainian Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov put the idea bluntly: after an Iskander is launched, a retaliatory missile should hit the launch position within minutes. This, however, requires an intelligence-and-strike network capable of detecting the launch site, determining the coordinates of a mobile launcher, and transmitting them to the missile unit before the crew can leave the position.

When striking deep behind enemy lines, the Ukrainian armed forces have so far remained heavily dependent on Western missiles. ATACMS quasi-ballistic missiles made it possible to hit enemy airfields, ammunition depots, command posts, and air defense systems at distances of up to 300 kilometers, but the batches supplied were small, and permission to use them against targets inside Russia's internationally recognized borders was not always forthcoming from Washington. Even the transfer of U.S. weapons from a third country requires approval from the U.S. government. For example, the purchase of 70 older-model ATACMS missiles from Turkey in 2026 required State Department approval and notification of Congress. Producing similar missiles domestically would remove such restrictions, allowing Ukraine’s military leadership to determine targets and the intensity of strikes independently, without waiting for its partners’ approval.

Ukraine’s own ballistic missiles would remove restrictions imposed by its allies

Ukrainian long-range drones and cruise missiles are already successfully striking targets deep inside Russian territory, but ballistic missiles meet a different need. They travel at several times the speed of sound and can reach their targets within minutes, sharply reducing the reaction time available to air defense crews. Their heavier warheads also make them suitable for attacking hardened or particularly important targets that a drone’s payload may be insufficient to destroy.

Fire Point CEO Iryna Terekh noted that a Russian ballistic missile can reach the Ukrainian capital in roughly two to five minutes. It is precisely this short interval between launch and impact that makes such weapons particularly dangerous.

The range of missiles being developed in Ukraine is intended to cover several different distances. The FP-7 tactical ballistic missile is designed to strike targets at distances of up to 200 kilometers, the Sapsan is reportedly capable of reaching up to 500 kilometers, while the heavier FP-9 has a range of up to 855 kilometers. If these programs are successfully implemented, the Ukrainian armed forces will be able to carry out rapid strikes both against the operational rear of the Russian command posts, airfields, ammunition depots, logistics hubs, and air defense positions, but also against military-industrial facilities much farther from the front line.

Unlike Fire Point’s FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile, which have a maximum speed of around 950 km/h, ballistic missiles like the Russian Iskander can reach speeds of up to 8,500 km/h, giving air defenses significantly less time to detect and intercept them. Notably, the Ukrainian FP-7 platform is being developed to work defensively as well, with its FP-7.x variant intended to serve as an interceptor within the joint European missile defense system Freya.

Ukrainian ballistic missiles are expected to reach targets several times faster than Flamingo cruise missiles

The mere appearance of a prototype missile does not provide a strategic advantage. To have a meaningful impact on the course of the war, Ukraine needs mass production, reliable supplies of components, domestic production of solid rocket fuel, secure manufacturing facilities, mobile launchers, and stable funding.

Ultimately, it will be the scale of production, rather than the stated specifications of individual prototypes, that determines whether Ukraine can reduce its dependence on ATACMS and turn its own ballistic missiles into a regularly used weapon. In August 2026, President Volodymyr Zelensky described the results of tests of Ukrainian ballistic missiles as promising while still acknowledging that the systems developed still had to be turned into a fully operational combat capability.

FP-7: one missile for both strike and interception

Of the three ballistic missile programs announced by Ukrainian private company Fire Point, the FP-7 is the closest to practical deployment: a compact, ground-launched solid-fuel missile. It was originally developed to strike ground targets, but the modular design has also made it possible to create the FP-7.x interceptor on the same platform. As a result, two different systems are being developed in parallel — a tactical missile and a component of the future European Freya missile defense system, whose first full-scale tests are scheduled for 2027.

The FP-7 incorporates design solutions from the Soviet 48N6 surface-to-air missile, variants of which are used in the S-300P and S-400 air defense systems. According to Fire Point CEO Terekh, the FP-7 is about 20% similar to the original design.

According to Defense Express, the developers retained the overall configuration and aerodynamic layout of the 48N6 but replaced its electronics, propellant, and launch system while manufacturing the missile body from composite materials. The extent of the design borrowing cannot, however, be assessed due to the fact that the company has not disclosed the missile’s internal design or the composition of its components.

The FP-7 is designed to carry a warhead weighing up to 150 kilograms to a range of up to 200 kilometers. Its stated maximum speed is 1,500 m/s, or about Mach 4.4, with a trajectory reaching up to 65 kilometers in altitude and a flight time of no more than 250 seconds. The manufacturer claims a circular error probable of up to 14 meters. These characteristics would allow the missile to be used against targets in the operational rear. Its range is shorter than that of later ATACMS variants, but it is intended to perform similar tasks and has one important advantage: its use does not require Washington’s approval.

By early August 2026, the strike version had completed around 15 test launches and was in the final stages of certification by Ukraine’s Defense Ministry. Fire Point expected the process to take another two to four weeks, after which the missile could be used against a real target for the first time — possibly as early as this fall. The FP-7 was tested using a hot launch (in which engine ignites directly on the launcher) from an inclined rail launcher mounted on an ordinary vehicle trailer. The configuration differs from the vertical canister launch used by S-300 surface-to-air missiles and is likely a simplified test setup for the time being. The final configuration of the combat vehicle has not been disclosed.

Of course, range testing and certification alone do not mean that the missile is ready for mass deployment. The first strikes should demonstrate how reliably its engine, navigation, and guidance systems perform outside controlled conditions, as well as how closely its actual accuracy matches the stated specifications.

Fire Point is also developing the faster FP-7.x, designed not to strike ground targets but to intercept ballistic threats. Conceptually, it is similar to the PAC-2 GEM-T interceptor used by Patriot systems — a heavy surface-to-air missile capable of engaging ballistic targets but lacking the hit-to-kill technology of the more advanced PAC-3 MSE.

In June 2026, Fire Point reported a test in which the missile completed a fully controlled, maneuvering flight. The video released by the company confirmed the launch and maneuvering but did not show an interception of a real target. That capability will be implemented once the various systems being developed by Ukraine's European partners are integrated into the project.

A successful interceptor flight is only one of the initial stages in developing a missile defense system. For the system to become fully functional, the missile must receive data from external radar stations, detect an incoming target, close with it at high speed, and detonate its warhead at the calculated point.

The FP-7.x is intended to form the backbone of the Freya system, officially launched in July 2026 by a coalition of 10 European countries and 12 defense companies (including Kongsberg, Eurosam, Leonardo, Thales and SAAB). The number of partner companies could eventually grow to 20, Fire Point CEO Terekh said. The Ukrainian company is responsible for the missile and launcher, while its partners are to provide the system’s most complex components.

Norway’s Kongsberg is developing a command center to integrate the various systems, while Germany’s Diehl Defense is working on guidance systems. Freya is being built on an “open architecture” principle, allowing individual components to be sourced from different manufacturers and replaced without redesigning the entire system. For example, a radar made by Danish company Weibel could be replaced with one from Sweden’s SAAB.

This approach should reduce dependence on any single company and make it easier to scale up production. At the same time, it complicates development: radars, the command center, the launcher, and the missile itself are being developed by different companies but must operate as a single system. In early August, Terekh said the most difficult stage of the project would be integrating surveillance and guidance radars with seeker heads, which are being manufactured by European companies but still need to be adapted for the FP-7.x and integrated with the other Freya components. Overall, according to Terekh, the company is prepared to produce at least 2,000 interceptors a year.

FP-9: a ballistic missile for the deep rear

The FP-9 is a heavy ground-launched ballistic missile being developed by Fire Point. While the FP-7 belongs to the tactical class and is intended to strike targets in the operational rear (up to 200 kilometers), the FP-9 is designed to reach the operational-strategic depth of several hundred kilometers. The manufacturer claims a range of up to 855 kilometers and a warhead weighing up to 800 kilograms. Its maximum speed is expected to reach 2,200 m/s, or about Mach 6.5, with a trajectory reaching up to 70 kilometers in altitude with a flight time of no more than 520 seconds. The claimed circular error probable is 20 meters.

A range of 855 kilometers would allow the missile to strike military targets across almost the entire European part of Russia. In terms of speed, the FP-9 is expected to be comparable to Russia’s Iskander-M ballistic missile, while its 800-kilogram warhead is far larger than that of ATACMS.

Unlike drones and most cruise missiles, the ballistic FP-9 would cover its trajectory within a matter of a few minutes, giving air defense crews substantially less time to detect and intercept it. At the same time, the published specifications remain the developer’s own figures: as far as is known, the FP-9 had not undergone a single flight test as of early August 2026.

According to Terekh, the navigation system and other main components of the FP-9 are already complete. Now work is focused on the engine, which has proved to be the main technical challenge. It contains 4.6 tons of solid rocket propellant — more than four times as much as the FP-7 engine. Such a charge cannot be produced simply by scaling up an existing design. Instead, it requires new mixers, propellant casting equipment, and a separate system for curing the motor after molding.

Historically, the production of large solid-fuel rocket motors was concentrated in the city of Pavlohrad, which is now regularly targeted by Russian missile strikes (1, 2, 3). In addition, Terekh said, local companies use a somewhat different technology from the one required by Fire Point. The company therefore decided to establish an alternative production base, building several facilities inside Ukraine while beginning construction of a plant in Denmark. Fire Point says it has already obtained the necessary permits to operate the facility.

The company initially planned to convert a building it had purchased, but the site failed to meet safety requirements for handling solid rocket propellant. As a result, Fire Point will have to build a new facility, with its commissioning postponed until the end of 2027. The cost of the project has meanwhile risen from €50 million to more than €150 million.

In effect, the developers have had to relearn much of the technology for preparing the propellant mixture, casting it, and subsequently curing the charges. This is not only a complex but also a dangerous process: large quantities of propellant and explosives are kept at a single facility, meaning that its destruction could bring the entire missile program to a halt.

Fire Point’s production system was designed from the outset as a distributed network. Terekh says that roughly 90 dispersed facilities play a role in the process — an ecosystem of workshops, warehouses, and logistics hubs rather than one large production center. The production of critical components is duplicated across several sites, increasing resilience to strikes at the cost of additional investment and complex logistics that require individual missile components to be moved between numerous concealed facilities before being assembled at a single location.

Fire Point’s missile production is organized as a distributed network

Fire Point plans to conduct the first test launch of the FP-9 in the fall of 2026 before moving on to testing the system under combat conditions. However, in a conversation with The War Zone Terekh declined to give a specific date, explaining that “a lot can go wrong” during testing.

Although the FP-9 is described as a ground-launched missile, neither the type of chassis the missile will use, the way the missile will be mounted, nor the number of missiles carried by a single vehicle is known. Given the missile’s weight, it will require a heavier mobile launcher, likely mounted on a truck chassis or semitrailer.

Here too, even a successful launch will only mark the beginning of the testing process, as the developers will still have to verify the missile’s stated range and accuracy, the reliability of its engine, and its ability to overcome air defense countermeasures. This means that the FP-9 remains an ambitious project rather than a ready-to-use weapon, with its ultimate timeline depending largely on the results of its first flights.

Sapsan tactical missile system: from a protracted development to combat deployment

Unlike Fire Point’s efforts, the Sapsan tactical missile system is a state-run development with a history spanning nearly two decades. Work began in 2006 but was repeatedly suspended due to insufficient funding. Then, in August of 2022, the Defense Ministry signed its first state procurement contract with the system’s developer, Pivdenne Design Bureau, under the 1KR1 designation, while Pivdenmash was brought into the production effort.

The 1KR1 Sapsan is a mobile, ground-based missile system equipped with a single-stage solid-fuel ballistic missile measuring 7 meters in length. The version developed for Ukraine’s armed forces was designed for a range of up to 500 kilometers, while the export variant known as Hrim-2 has a range of up to 280 kilometers. The missile’s weight is estimated at around 3.5 tons, with a 500-kilogram warhead. The system is designed to strike command posts, airfields, ammunition depots, communications hubs, and other important targets in the enemy’s operational and operational-strategic rear. However, the stated specifications are based primarily on design documents and commentary from people involved in the program, while the official parameters of the missile adopted for service have not been disclosed.

According to former Ukrainian Defense Ministry official Oleksandr Liiev, the first tests of the 1KR1 Sapsan missile system took place in 2023, followed by the first test strikes against targets in Russia in 2024. As Liiev explained in 2025, “the system entered regular use” and production became serial. Meanwhile, Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed as early as March 2023 that it had intercepted “one Hrim-2 tactical missile," and since then it has claimed (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8) to have intercepted a total of 10 missiles. The ministry also said (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) it had struck “ammunition production facilities” for Hrim tactical missiles, as well as their launchers.

Public statements by Ukrainian officials have been more cautious. In August 2024, Zelensky spoke (1, 2) only of the successful “test of Ukraine’s first ballistic missile.” In May 2025, then-head of the Presidential Office Andriy Yermak announced its first combat use, saying the missile had struck a Russian command post at a range of nearly 300 kilometers. In June 2025, Zelensky said preparations were underway for mass production of the Sapsan, without specifying a timeline or projected number of missiles.

In July 2026, the program apparently underwent another round of testing. Mykhailo Fedorov said in early August that on his final day as defense minister, July 14, 2026, an unnamed ballistic missile — likely the Sapsan, given the fact that the FP-9 is only preparing for its first flight, while the FP-7 is in the final stages of certification — was tested and hit “exactly on target, without deviation.” Federov previously reported that the military had revised the system's technical requirements, achieved maximum accuracy, and reduced the missile’s cost by 30%.

If the July test did indeed involve the Sapsan, it would show that the program is continuing to develop alongside Fire Point’s private projects. However, the lack of production data and information regarding the system’s combat performance means that no conclusions about its effectiveness can yet be drawn.

Nightfall: a British ballistic missile for Ukraine

Alongside its domestic development programs, Ukraine’s armed forces may receive a ballistic missile being developed specifically for them in the United Kingdom. In January 2026, the British Defense Ministry announced a competition for the Nightfall project — a mobile, ground-based missile system. The project is not yet a finished weapon, but it does qualify as an accelerated development program whose results the UK expects to use in future long-range systems for its own armed forces as well.

Under the competition requirements, the missile must deliver a conventional high-explosive warhead weighing about 200 kilograms to a range of more than 500 kilometers and reach its target in less than 600 seconds. Its circular error probable must not exceed 10 meters, while its navigation system must function under conditions of heavy electronic warfare interference and in the absence of a satellite signal. Each mobile launcher is expected to carry several missiles that can be fired at short intervals, after which the crew must be able to leave the position within 15 minutes.

The initial requirements published in summer 2025 were more ambitious: the range was estimated at around 600 kilometers, the warhead was to weigh 300 kilograms, and the maximum cost per missile was set at £500,000 (excluding the warhead, launcher, and development costs). By the time the official competition was launched, however, the required range and warhead weight had been reduced, while the maximum price was raised to £800,000.

In terms of capability, Nightfall will be significantly less powerful than the Sapsan and FP-9, but it should have a longer range than the FP-7, occupying an intermediate niche between tactical and heavier tactical ballistic missiles. An important advantage will be its minimal dependence on third-country export licenses, though if the missile uses predominantly British components, the government in London will be able to make its own decisions on transferring the weapons.

Up to three design teams are to receive £9 million each and provide three missiles within 12 months for test launches. The British Defense Ministry subsequently plans to produce at least 10 missiles a month and has the capacity to scale up production. Development contracts were signed in May 2026, but the subsequent resignation of Keir Starmer created additional uncertainty over the project’s timeline.

Although the new government has not announced any plans to revise the program, its implementation could be delayed by possible cuts or reallocations of defense spending. Even if the original schedule is maintained, prototypes may not appear until spring 2027 at the earliest, after which further testing and preparations for serial production will be required. Nightfall’s significance, therefore, will depend less on its stated specifications than on whether the competition can be turned into a mass-produced weapon within a compressed timeframe.

Prospects for Ukraine’s ballistic missile programs

The real scale of Fire Point’s capabilities is best illustrated by its experience producing the FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile. The company announced plans to produce up to seven missiles a day. It failed to reach that target, but CEO Terekh later explained that seven missiles was in fact the maximum capacity of the production lines that had been built, but that there were not enough orders to fully utilize them. 

The plan to produce at least 2,000 FP-7.x interceptors a year is even more ambitious. CIT considers it unrealistic and compares it with Lockheed Martin's efforts to expand PAC-3 production. The company produced around 620 interceptors in 2025 and expects to reach an annual capacity of 2,000 only by the end of 2030 — efforts that would not be possible without support from the Pentagon, which is signing multibillion-dollar agreements with several suppliers of rocket motors, seeker heads, and other components. Fire Point has no comparable financial or industrial resources, and a key component of the FP-7.x — its seeker head — is still being refined by Kyiv's European partners. “If the company manages to achieve the stated target, it will be a major success,” the analysts write.

Fire Point’s production plans look overly ambitious

In other words, the path from a functioning prototype to sustained serial production is long. Production rates for the FP-7, FP-7.x, and FP-9 will depend on government orders, partner financing, and regular supplies of components. A program should therefore be assessed not by the specifications announced by its developer, but by the number of weapons the company can reliably deliver to the armed forces each month.

The secrecy surrounding the missile programs makes forecasting difficult. The situation surrounding the Sapsan missile system and its ballistic missiles remains highly uncertain, with most information about the program being based on statements by officials. The launcher and mock-ups of the system were publicly displayed even before the full-scale war, but the missiles themselves have never been seen.

Among Fire Point’s various projects, the FP-7 is the closest to practical deployment, as the company has demonstrated its launch and reported around 15 tests (without disclosing their results or confirming the start of serial deliveries). The missile is currently undergoing certification by Ukraine’s Defense Ministry. Meanwhile, however, Britain’s Nightfall only exists at the level of technical requirements and development contracts, the FP-9 is still preparing for its first launch, and the FP-7.x has completed a controlled flight but has not intercepted a ballistic target. 

A CIT expert who asked to remain anonymous believes that the publicly available information is insufficient to determine whether the promised combat use of the FP-7 will actually take place this fall. “You need to have at least some information about how the project is progressing. What has been reported in the media simply doesn’t allow you to understand that,” he told The Insider, adding that Fire Point has “not the most reliable” track record when it comes to fulfilling public promises. That does not, however, mean that the announced deadlines will necessarily be missed.

Sapsan, for its part, raises no fewer questions. Officials were still claiming in 2025 that it was in serial production and being used regularly, while Mykhailo Fedorov spoke of new tests in summer 2026 and the need to complete the program. “Maybe there will be more tests a year from now,” the CIT expert says.

Military expert Kirill Mikhailov takes a considerably more optimistic view of the pace of development, pointing out that it took the United States around nine years to develop ATACMS, despite the capabilities of the U.S. defense industry during the Cold War. Against this backdrop, he considers the speed with which Ukraine has brought its own ballistic missile programs to the testing stage to be exceptional. Mikhailov is also not inclined to doubt Fedorov’s claim about the successful Sapsan test: in his view, the former minister would not have made such a statement without sufficient grounds.

Although producing hundreds of FP-7 missiles a month would not in itself represent a strategic breakthrough in the war, Ukraine's regular use of ballistic missiles could change the situation in the Russian military’s operational rear. If the new systems' accuracy and reliable targeting are confirmed, a domestic Ukrainian ballistic missile capability would make it possible for Kyiv to move from occasional launches of scarce ATACMS to regular strikes against Russian command posts, airfields, ammunition depots, and air defense systems at depths of up to 200 kilometers. Russia’s military leadership would have to disperse its forces, strengthen the protection of key facilities, and move infrastructure farther from the front line.

The success of Ukraine’s ballistic missile program will be determined not by the speed of development or the missiles’ specifications, but by their serial production and combat performance. The prospects for Freya will also depend on the successful integration of seeker heads, detection and tracking radars, and data links.

Citizenship was granted to 151 people through naturalization, and another 60 received it on family grounds (mainly through marriage to a Lithuanian citizen). Among those, 58 people were born in Russia and 29 in Belarus.

Another 65 people obtained citizenship through a simplified procedure based on Lithuanian origin, including 18 individuals born in Russia and three born in Belarus. Two people born in Russia had their previously lost Lithuanian citizenship restored.

In total, 76 Russian-born and 32 Belarusian-born people received Lithuanian citizenship for the first time, with 87 of these 108 individuals obtaining it through the standard procedure rather than on the basis of Lithuanian origin.

According to entrepreneur and public figure Viktor Vorontsov, those granted citizenship under the August decrees include people from Russia who had lived in Lithuania for up to 18 years. In total, the lists include 286 individuals: 158 women and 128 men. Their median age is 41. The youngest is three years old, the oldest is 82, and 15 applicants are minors.

The presidential decrees list the applicants’ country of birth and current place of residence, but not their citizenship prior to obtaining Lithuanian citizenship. Therefore, it cannot be definitely stated that all of those born in Russia or Belarus were citizens of those countries at the time of application.

The decision stands out against the backdrop of Lithuania’s current migration policy, implemented in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which places special restrictions on citizens of Russia and Belarus when it comes to obtaining Lithuanian visas and e-residency permits. Russians are also subject to additional checks when crossing the EU’s external border and face restrictions on purchasing real estate.

In 2025, Lithuania’s Migration Department deemed 1,721 citizens of Russia and Belarus to pose a threat to national security, public order, or public health. Among them were 1,634 Belarusian nationals and 87 Russians, who were all denied the issuance or renewal of residence permits or had their already-issued documents revoked.

Further tightening of restrictions has been discussed in 2026. In March, lawmakers from the conservative Homeland Union — Lithuanian Christian Democrats proposed suspending the acceptance of new temporary residence permit applications from citizens of Russia and Belarus. In July, Lithuania’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs proposed introducing additional national sanctions, including restrictions on the purchase by Russians and Belarusians of real estate near strategic facilities.

After the start of the full-scale war, the review of citizenship applications from citizens of these countries was effectively suspended for a time, but the President’s Office later resumed it. Nausėda’s advisor Ridas Jasiulionis explained that applications are now reviewed under additional vetting that assesses whether granting citizenship serves Lithuania’s interests.

For standard naturalization, applicants generally need to have resided permanently and legally in Lithuania for at least ten years, hold the right to permanent residence, have a legal source of income, and pass exams on the Lithuanian language and the fundamentals of the Constitution. Renouncing the other citizenship is generally required as well, unless the applicant falls under exceptions provided by law. For citizenship obtained through marriage, seven years of living together in Lithuania is typically required.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe arrived in Moscow on Tuesday, Aug. 25. At the time, the Kremlin stated that it had no information regarding the U.S. Air Force plane that landed at Vnukovo and that it had no plans to meet with representatives of the U.S. administration.

The exact reason for Ratcliffe’s visit remains unknown. According to one version, his trip may be related to the release from a Russian penal colony of American Charles Wayne Zimmerman, who was convicted of firearms smuggling. According to another, Ratcliffe intended to deliver a warning to Putin based on new U.S. intelligence.

The last time a CIA Director visited Moscow was in November 2021, when William Burns held a phone call from the Kremlin with Putin, who was in Sochi at the time.

According to Reuters, since the start of 2026 at least 31 cargoes totalling 2.3 million metric tons of LNG have been shipped from Arctic LNG 2 to the Chinese port of Beihai. Vessels involved in the shipments include the LNG carriers Voskhod, Arctic Pioneer, Arctic Vostok, Zarya, Arctic Mulan, La Pérouse, Buran, and Arctic Metagaz.

Notably, in March, the Arctic Metagaz was disabled in a drone attack in the Mediterranean Sea.

The Arctic LNG 2 project itself has been under international sanctions since 2023. The restrictions also apply to part of its infrastructure and to the vessels servicing the project. Nevertheless, Novatek and its partners continue to ramp up production and exports.

At least 18 LNG carriers are currently involved in the shipments, including the new Aleksey Kosygin and Konstantin Posiet, built at Russia’s Zvezda shipyard. Part of the fleet is used to transport LNG via the Saam floating storage units near the Kola Peninsula and Koryak in Kamchatka.

In addition, several more LNG carriers, mostly around 20 years old, have recently been acquired for Russian shipments. TradeWinds identifies these as the Merkuriy, Luch, Kosmos, Orion, Arctic Express, Chaivo, and Avacha. Some of them have already taken part in LNG operations near the Kola Peninsula.

In parallel, Russia continues to build new vessels. Two more LNG carriers — the Sergey Witte and Viktor Chernomyrdin — are scheduled to enter service in 2026–2027.

The Barents Observer expects further growth in Russian Arctic LNG shipments to China once the EU’s full ban on Russian LNG, planned for Jan. 1, 2027, takes effect. The restrictions will also affect Yamal LNG, which, unlike Arctic LNG 2, is not currently under sanctions.

On Aug. 15, forensic experts from the Federal Criminal Police Office found approximately 50 grams of an unidentified substance at the scene. According to a preliminary assessment, it could have been RDX, a powerful military-grade explosive. Investigators say the act of sabotage that appears to have been planned may have been larger in scale than previously thought.

The first drone equipped with professional-grade explosives and a detonator was found on the airport grounds late on the evening of Aug. 4. The device had failed to go off, reportedly due to a technical malfunction. According to investigators, the target was a Ukrainian Antonov cargo plane that was being used to transport weapons.

Approximately 20 minutes after the first drone was discovered, a DHL cargo plane may have collided with a second drone. Because the airport was closed, the crew aborted the landing and went around for another approach. Shortly before the impact, the pilots spotted an object roughly 30 centimeters in size.

The plane was diverted to Hanover, where investigators found damage to its tail section. An examination ruled out a bird strike. The drone itself was not found, and investigators believe it may have gone into the engine on impact and disintegrated into small pieces.

In Kursdorf, north of the airport, an antenna and electronic equipment attached to a tree were also found. Investigators believe the devices may have been used to control one of the drones. Nearby, charred earth and metal fragments were discovered, and witnesses recalled hearing an explosion several hours before the incident at the airport began.

The investigation into the incidents is being headed by Germany’s Federal Prosecutor’s Office, which is treating the case as an attempted attack on the country’s transport and logistics infrastructure. Leipzig/Halle Airport is one of Europe’s largest cargo hubs. It is used by NATO, DHL, and the Ukrainian airline Antonov Airlines. The office has not yet named any suspects.

Law enforcement sources who spoke with German media suggest that Russian intelligence services could have been involved in preparing the attack. However, German authorities have not officially made any accusations against Russia. Chancellor Friedrich Merz promised that the government would name the responsible parties soon.

The Russian Embassy in Berlin previously called the incident a “fabricated provocation,” accusing German authorities of stoking “anti-Russian hysteria.” Moscow denies having had any involvement in sabotage or other hybrid operations in Germany.

Grounds for imposing temporary control may include failure to take security measures or a delay in taking them, the violation of established requirements, creating a threat to the facility’s normal operation, or even a delay in restoring it after damage was incurred. The decree separately mentions “ineffective implementation of measures” aimed at preventing drone attacks.

Russian authorities will be able to place all or part of a company’s movable and immovable property, its securities and stakes in Russian legal entities, and its property rights under temporary control. The decision will be made by the government on Putin’s instructions. The Federal Agency for State Property Management (Rosimushchestvo) will step in as the temporary manager by default, unless replaced by a different organization. The manager will receive all relevant ownership powers other than the right to dispose of the transferred property. The decree does not limit the duration of temporary control, which can likewise be terminated by the government on the president’s instructions.

The decree defines “critical infrastructure facilities” as enterprises in the fuel and energy sector (including nuclear facilities), communications facilities, as well as utility, transport, and logistics infrastructure. The list remains open-ended, however, and the mechanism can also be applied to other facilities that authorities deem to be of “particular importance” for Russia’s security, economic stability, or the population’s livelihood.

The decree comes amid a sharp increase in Ukrainian attacks on Russian industrial and logistics infrastructure. Oil refineries have been a constant target of Ukrainian drones since early 2024, with the intensity of the strikes increasing in 2025. In 2026, Ukraine further scaled up the campaign. As the Financial Times reported, in the first half of the year alone, Ukrainian drones successfully struck Russian refineries at least 194 times — at 11 times the rate in the same period of 2025. By April, the monthly average of successful strikes on refinery production facilities and tank farms exceeded ten and subsequently held at roughly that level. Following the attacks, some refineries scaled back or completely halted oil processing for extensive periods, sometimes taking weeks to return to normal operation. Notably, some facilities have been hit multiple times.

Three days before the decree was signed, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak instructed oil companies to revise refinery maintenance schedules in order to avoid exacerbating the fuel shortage. Now, a delay in restoring facilities could have direct consequences for owners, as Putin’s decree explicitly names the untimely restoration of critical infrastructure after damage as grounds for imposing temporary control over a company’s property.

Since July 18, the warehouse infrastructure of the major online retailer Wildberries has also come under systematic attack. By Aug. 19, The Insider had counted 21 attacked marketplace facilities across 16 Russian regions and annexed Simferopol, affecting a combined storage area of about 2.3 million square meters. Fourteen facilities covering about 1.77 million square meters sustained significant damage, forcing the company to relocate some of its operations to other sites. Warehouse employees were killed and injured in several attacks. Volodymyr Zelensky has stated that the targeted logistics centers were used to supply the Russian army with drone production components, navigation equipment, and gear.

On Aug. 22, Ukrainian drones hit a logistics facility of another online retailer, Ozon, for the first time. The target of that strike was a warehouse in Chapayevsk, Samara Region. Then, on Aug. 23, a strike hit a facility in Orenburg, and overnight into Aug. 24, drones struck Ozon warehouses in Dagestan, Adygea, Krasnodar Krai, and Stavropol Krai. Fires broke out at the facilities near Krasnodar and Makhachkala, forcing them to halt operations.

The memo’s introduction lists the economic difficulties Russia has faced amid the war, with all figures current as of April: a budget deficit of 4.58 trillion rubles in the first quarter (against an annual target of 3.8 trillion rubles), a high key interest rate of 15% (which is “choking the civilian sector”), a 45.4% decline in oil and gas revenues (down to 1.44 trillion rubles), and the disruption caused by Ukrainian drone strikes on oil refineries (taking 10–15% of refining capacity offline).

“The government is considering increasing the deficit and military spending. The military multiplier is estimated at 1.5x — every ruble of military spending generates 1.5 rubles of GDP, but at the expense of crowding out the civilian sector.”

The document also says that Russia has lost “up to 35% of the components of air defense systems,” while the replacement of S-300/400 systems is proceeding more slowly than the losses. “Without restoring the air defense umbrella over rear facilities, strikes will intensify,” the memo says. It also lays out a range of other problems areas:

“Labor shortages at defense enterprises: 80,000–400,000 people. Ammunition production showed a decline for the first time in September 2025. Three critical shortages: microelectronics (without Western components, precision weapons become several times more expensive), ammunition (the limiting factor is people, not money), and engines (aircraft, missile and naval engines are all overloaded).”

The document estimates Russia’s military losses at 20,000–25,000 people per month. “90% of new contract soldiers are used to replenish losses, not to form new units,” the memo says. However, it notes that a full-scale mobilization is not currently planned due to the fact that "the political risk is unacceptable.”

Eight scenarios for ending the war

Decisive Russian military advantage. Probability: 7%. Time horizon: 12–24 months

What this entails:

Full Russian control over Ukraine's Kharkiv region, in addition to the four “new regions” (the “Donetsk People’s Republic,”  the“Luhansk People’s Republic,” and Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions within their administrative borders) that Russia claimed to have annexed in 2022. Under this scenairo, Kyiv would be forced into negotiations due to Moscow's position of absolute military dominance on the battlefield. Without capturing the Ukrainian capital, Russia would nevertheless create conditions in which continued resistance no longer makes military sense.

What would be required to achieve this outcome:

• A second wave of mobilization — at least 300,000–500,000 people. Without it, the manpower needed for a large-scale offensive is unattainable.
• A several-fold increase in Russia's capacity to wage the war from the air, with the production of UMPK glide-bomb kits and glide bombs representing the current bottleneck.
• Solving the problem of rear-area air defense — without it, Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil refineries and airfields will continue.
• A breakthrough in autonomous drone swarms — the first side to deploy fully autonomous swarms on a divisional scale (thousands of units coordinated by AI, without operators) would gain a decisive tactical advantage.

Conclusion: Russia needs a large-scale offensive, while Ukraine’s goal is to make the cost of such an offensive unacceptable for Russia.

“The motivation to defend is traditionally stronger than the motivation to attack — Ukraine is fighting for survival, not territorial expansion.”

“Western exhaustion” — peace on Russia’s terms. Probability: 12%. Time horizon: 12–18 months

What this entails:

Ukraine loses a critical mass of Western support, and its allies stop financing Kyiv's defensive efforts. This would not be a military defeat, but a political one. Russia would retain the territories it currently occupies, secure the lifting of some sanctions, and obtain guarantees that Ukraine will not join NATO.

What is required:

Three factors would need to converge: support for Ukraine in the United States falling below 30%, an energy crisis in Europe during the winter of 2026–2027, and a domestic political crisis in Ukraine.

“Time is Russia’s trump card: every month of waiting means less Western support, less Ukrainian mobilization, and less European unity.”

“Trump deal” — frozen conflict with partial sanctions relief. Probability: 32%. Time horizon: 6–12 months

What this entails:

Donald Trump pushes through a deal ahead of the U.S. midterm elections (November 2026) by using U.S. aid to Ukraine as leverage against both sides. The conflict is frozen along the current lines, some sanctions are lifted, and NATO remains closed to Ukraine.

“Trump called the 10-point Iranian peace plan ‘workable.’ The model has been confirmed: ultimatum + deadline + mediator = deal. After Iran, Ukraine is the next target.”

“Korean freeze” — an end to the fighting, but with no formal agreement. Probability: 22%. Time horizon: 6–18 months

What this entails:

The conflict winds down without a formal agreement. The intensity of fighting decreases and the front line stabilizes, but legally the war continues. There is neither a peace treaty nor a ceasefire — only a de facto halt to large-scale military operations. Low-level drone warfare continues.

What is required:

Mutual exhaustion without either side having the capacity to achieve a decisive breakthrough.

Protracted war (another 2–3 years). Probability: 15%. Time horizon: 24–36 months

What this entails:

The conflict continues at something resembling its current level of intensity. There is neither a freeze nor a breakthrough. Russian monthly losses remain at 20,000–25,000, and creeping advances of 100–200 meters per day continue, along with long-range strikes against infrastructure on both sides. The strategy is one of attrition.

“If diplomacy fails, the war continues by inertia. Both sides have invested too much in the conflict to stop absent an external push.”

The memo offers the following sociological forecast for this scenario:

“For Russia — growing ‘quiet fatigue.’ Not protest (suppressed by the security services), but social disengagement: rising alcoholism, depression, emigration of skilled workers, and declining birth rates. The economic model of ‘guns instead of butter’ works for 2–3 years, but not indefinitely. Putin’s approval rating could fall below 60% by 2028, with actual support dropping below 50%. The critical threshold of the ‘spiral of silence’ is reached when people stop being afraid to speak out. Historically, this happens in Russia when living standards fall noticeably (perestroika, 1986–1991).

For Ukraine, it means a humanitarian catastrophe —  eight million refugees abroad, six million internally displaced, a demographic collapse resulting from falling birthrates, and the loss of an entire generation of men aged 25–45 (mobilization + emigration + casualties).”

Peace on compromise terms. Probability: 5%. Time horizon: 12–24 months

What this entails:

A comprehensive peace treaty involving mutual concessions. Russia returns some territory (parts or all of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions) in exchange for recognition of Crimea and parts of Donbas. Ukraine receives security guarantees and a path to EU membership. NATO membership is subject to a 15–25-year moratorium.

What is required:

A change in the political configuration on one side, such as a significant weakening of Putin’s position (unlikely under the current power structure), a change of government in Ukraine (possibly via a constitutional crisis), or strong external pressure against both sides simultaneously. If the United States pressures Russia through sanctions and the threat of arming Ukraine, China pressures Russia through economic leverage, and the EU pressures Ukraine through the conditions attached to aid and future membership, such a scenario at least becomes possible.

Peace on Ukraine’s/Europe’s terms. Probability: 2%. Time horizon: 24–36+ months

What this entails:

Russia is forced to withdraw to its 2014 or 1991 borders. Crimea becomes a subject of negotiations or is returned to Ukraine. Ukraine joins NATO. Russia pays reparations. An arms-control regime is established.

What is required:

An economic collapse in Russia (GDP contracting by 15% or more, hyperinflation, and a default on domestic debt), a catastrophic military defeat, or a change of regime that brings “negotiators” to power. All three scenarios are extremely unlikely.

“Wild card” — black swans. Probability: 5% (combined for all sub-scenarios). Time horizon: unpredictable

What this entails:

Unlikely but high-impact events capable of radically altering the trajectory of the conflict. None of these sub-scenarios can be predicted using standard analytical methods, as they lie beyond the “probability cone.” However, their consequences could be significantly more extreme than those of all the other scenarios combined.

• Nuclear escalation. Russia uses tactical nuclear weapons in a demonstrative strike on an unpopulated area or Ukrainian military facility. The logic: a limited nuclear strike would convince the West that continued support for Ukraine risks an apocalypse, thereby forcing its opponents to back down. The consequences would be immediate and would likely lead to Russia's total isolation diplomatically.
• “A new Chernobyl.” An accident or deliberate strike on a nuclear facility — the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, the Chernobyl sarcophagus, or spent nuclear fuel storage facilities located in Ukraine. The consequences would include radioactive contamination spreading across several countries, an immediate ceasefire under pressure from the entire international community (including China), and a humanitarian catastrophe involving the evacuation of millions of people.
• Regime change. In Russia, a “palace coup” in which a group from the security establishment (FSB, Defense Ministry, Security Council) removes Putin in order to conclude a peace deal on acceptable terms. In Ukraine, a constitutional crisis putting Zelensky's legitimacy into question, possibly resulting in the military leadership putting forward an alternative candidate to head the country. 
• Iran cascade. The U.S.-Iran ceasefire (April 8) collapses and talks in Pakistan fail. Israel continues its strikes on Lebanon and Iran. Iran closes the Strait of Hormuz. Brent crude rises above $200, triggering a global recession and sharply increasing Russia’s oil revenues at the same time the West faces an energy crisis and industrial recession. With Western attention and resources redirected towards the Middle East, Ukraine would lose its place of priority on the Western agenda.
• Technological surprise. A breakthrough in AI-controlled drone swarms creates an absolute tactical advantage for one side or the other. Alternatively, a cyberattack on critical infrastructure (the power grid, banking system, or military command) could cripple one side’s ability to wage war. Other possibilities include a fundamentally new AI architecture (not based on transformers), quantum computing capable of breaking military encryption, or directed-energy weapons (laser air-defense systems capable of intercepting drones at $0.01 per shot instead of $100,000 per missile).

Conclusions

Moscow's window of maximum negotiating leverage will be open until the fall of 2026. After that, the balance is expected to shift as the liquid portion of Russia's National Wealth Fund (~4 trillion rubles) continues to be depleted by withdrawls of around 400 billion rubles per quarter, Europe’s rearmament is gathering pace ($50–60 billion by 2027), and Trump is turning his attention to the midterm elections and may lose interest in a “deal.”

The optimal strategy from the Russian perspective would be to secure the maximum achievable outcome through diplomacy while maintaining military pressure. Both efforts should be pursued simultaneously.

The most likely outcome is not “victory,” but “the best available option.” Scenarios 3 and 4 (“Trump deal” + “Korean freeze”) account for a combined 54% — more than half of the probability space. Preparing for negotiations is no less important than maintaining military pressure. The diplomatic and military tracks should operate in parallel, not sequentially.

Yerevan says this marks the beginning of the end for the Eurasian Economic Union, which Moscow once spearheaded. At the same time, however, Armenia still has no plans to hold a referendum on joining the European Union anytime soon. Instead, it intends to respond to the sanctions with sanctions of its own while preserving its vital trade with Russia to the extent that Moscow's policies still allow for that to be possible.  

What Moscow wants from Yerevan

As Armenia was busy campaigning this past spring ahead of the parliamentary elections, an unexpected message arrived from the other four members of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) – Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan – amid a summit being held in Astana, Kazakhstan. On May 29, they issued a special statement concerning the fifth member of their union, Armenia. It said, among other things:

“We share the view that a nationwide referendum should be held in the Republic of Armenia as soon as possible on joining the European Union or remaining in the Eurasian Economic Union.”

It thus became clear that Russia was not the only country demanding that Armenia make a choice about its geopolitical and economic orientation. The remainining members of the EAEU, it turned out, were also unwilling to risk a confrontation with Russia over Armenia.

Notably, the statement was adopted without the participation of the Armenian prime minister. At the time, Nikol Pashinyan was occupied with domestic political concerns, but after familiarizing himself with his colleagues’ position, he responded in distinctly ironic fashion:

“I am grateful to my EAEU colleagues for recognizing Armenia’s legitimate right, as well as that of any other EAEU member state, to develop relations with various partners and create trade and economic alternatives for its country. I believe such an approach is beneficial to the EAEU, since the existence of possible alternatives is a factor that will contribute to the EAEU’s competitiveness and attractiveness.”

After the statement issued in Astana, Russia tightened its sanctions against Armenia. After winning the elections, Pashinyan eventually called Vladimir Putin.

What the “sworn allies” talked about

Reports of possible Russian sanctions emerged as Armenia’s election campaign got underway. Before that, Pashinyan had traveled to Moscow and heard the Kremlin’s request to allow pro-Russian forces to participate in the elections. They were indeed allowed to run.

But even that concession failed to prevent the now-familiar notifications from Rospotrebnadzor, Russia’s consumer protection watchdog. One after another, Armenian products were found to be in violation of Russian quality standards. First, the ban affected the well-known Jermuk mineral water, as well as wine and brandy from selected producers. Then flowers, fruits, and vegetables followed.

“From May 30, 2026, Rosselkhoznadzor is imposing temporary restrictions on the import of fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, leafy greens, and strawberries originating from and shipped from Armenia until an appropriate process is developed to ensure the safety of the products being shipped,” the agency said in a statement.

It also became clear that, unlike in previous cases, the Kremlin was prepared to play the long game. The restrictions targeted the largest segment of Armenian exports and were imposed just before the harvest season. For years, Russia had been the main market for Armenian apricots, cherries, apples, tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers. Moscow was naturally counting on this dependence as a reliable lever of pressure.

In Armenia, there were hopes that after the elections everything would return to normal – that the sanctions were merely an attempt to influence voters to turn against Pashinyan. But those expectations quickly evaporated as the prime minister's Civil Contract party secured a parliamentary majority. In Moscow, officials began considering what else they could ban.

They found something. The next wave targeted fish and dairy products, meaning that in effect, virtually all Armenian value-added goods that had carved out a niche in the Russian market and attracted Russian consumers were now subject to restrictions.

The Armenian prime minister then decided to speak to Russia’s president to see how the problem could be resolved. After the first reports of a phone call between Pashinyan and Putin, everyone eagerly awaited details. The Kremlin website published a very brief but quite explicit communiqué that left little room for ambiguity:

“Vladimir Putin reaffirmed his commitment to the Joint Statement adopted at the EAEU summit in Astana on May 29, 2026, by the leaders of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia concerning the actions of the Republic of Armenia aimed at joining the European Union. In particular, the need to hold a nationwide referendum in Armenia as soon as possible on joining the EU or remaining in the EAEU was emphasized.”

It thus became clear that no one in Moscow intended to resolve the problems through negotiations. Yerevan was being required to hold a referendum.

There will be a referendum, but later

Having realized that Moscow was no longer showing much restraint either in its statements or its policies, Yerevan decided to stop holding back as well. Prime Minister Pashinyan openly stated that the EAEU’s mechanisms were not working: “The problem is not Armenia, but the EAEU, because it turns out that the Eurasian Economic Union is paralyzed and does not work. If this issue is not resolved quickly, let me predict that this will mark the beginning of the end of the EAEU.”

“The Eurasian Economic Union is paralyzed and does not work,” Nikol Pashinyan said

Then, in early August, Pashinyan traveled to Bishkek for a meeting of the Eurasian Intergovernmental Council. While there, he criticized the bloc and asserted his country’s right to pursue alternatives:

“It is the legitimate right of any country – all countries work to ensure that they have alternatives. At this point, the best position for the EAEU would not be to ‘torpedo’ this process, but, on the contrary, to work toward increasing the EAEU’s competitiveness and attractiveness. This is the right approach, and Armenia is ready to work on it.”

But the EAEU is unlikely to take this proposal seriously, all the more so given the fact that Russia had viewed Armenia as its outpost for decades. However, in recent years the status quo in the South Caucasus has changed. Moscow is no longer the only player in the region – and it is no longer even the most influential one. The Kremlin is naturally unwilling to accept this reality, but Russia now has few instruments for exerting influence beyond economic pressure.

Why Russia lost Armenia

Armenia lost Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020. A few years later, following the exodus of the Armenian population from the unrecognized republic, Russia lost its main source of leverage in the region. For years, the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict had given Moscow the necessary means to pressure both Yerevan and Baku. That was enough to keep the two post-Soviet republics’ foreign policies closely aligned with Moscow’s wishes.

But in September 2023, Azerbaijan established full control over Karabakh. In the aftermath, around 120,000 Armenians fled their homes over the course of just two days, while Russian peacekeepers remained mere bystanders. In the end, there was no one left to “keep the peace,” and the Russian contingent withdrew from Karabakh two years ahead of schedule.

This was, without exaggeration, a catastrophe for the Kremlin’s regional policy, and it is particularly telling that it happened in Nagorno-Karabakh, where attitudes toward Russia had been exceptionally favorable. Beyond the political consequences, Moscow also suffered enormous reputational damage, with Russia’s standing in Armenia effectively collapsing in the years following the war. Just before the confict, 92% of Armenians described relations with Russia as good, but by 2024, 66% of respondents described relations with Russia as “bad” or “very bad.” In spring 2026, 55% of respondents said they did not trust Russia.

By 2024, 66% of respondents described relations with Russia as “bad” or “very bad”

The situation could still have been salvaged after 2020. Nagorno-Karabakh was officially not part of Armenia, and Russia had every formal right not to help Yerevan maintain control over the region. But the events that followed cemented the Kremlin’s reputation as an unreliable ally.

After the loss of Karabakh, Baku escalated the conflict by bringing the conflict to Armenian territory itself on several occasions. In September 2022, Azerbaijan’s armed forces launched an offensive, crossed the state border, and seized additional territory. Hundreds of people were killed in the process, making it clear that Armenia would struggle to defend itself against external threats on its own.

Yerevan had options, including through the Collective Security Treaty Organization. Armenia formally appealed to its military allies for assistance, but in response it did not even receive political support. Instead, the allies said it was necessary to establish where exactly the border between the two states ran.

Yerevan thus directed its appeals to the West, but Brussels asked it to definitively abandon any claims to Nagorno-Karabakh. In return, the EU was prepared to send a civilian mission to Armenia that would provide political, economic, humanitarian, and even military assistance. Pashinyan agreed, thereby depriving Moscow of its exclusive control over developments in the South Caucasus.

Leverage and countermeasures

The Armenian economy remained dependent on Russia even eight years after the 2018 Velvet Revolution. Suffice it to say that, before the recent sanctions were imposed, 90% of Armenia’s agricultural exports went to Russia. According to the latest official data from Armenia’s Statistical Committee, Russia accounted for 35.6% of the republic’s total exports in the first half of 2026.

But contrary to expectations, Russia’s restrictions have neither crippled the Armenian economy nor triggered a serious collapse – at least not yet. There will be losses in the long term, but the Armenian government nevertheless remains focused on finding alternatives.

Against this backdrop, the European Union is reaching out to Yerevan. Brussels has already allocated tens of millions of dollars in assistance to strengthen the economy under the “Armenia Growth Plan,” while also partially opening its markets to Armenian products. As a result, fruits and vegetables from Armenia have appeared on the shelves of stores in France, Poland, and the Netherlands.

Of course, Russia still has other levers of pressure. One is natural gas., which Armenia continues to buy from Russian despite Moscow making it clear that prices could be revised soon. Additionally, the 102nd Russian military base is still stationed in Armenia, while Russian Railways operates Armenia’s railway network. 

If necessary, however, the Armenian authorities will make use of these cards, as Prime Minister Pashinyan has already said:

“There is a lot of talk now, mainly from the opposition, about the possibility of this or that becoming more expensive. But it may turn out that, for what was provided free of charge in Armenia for 30 years, Armenia will start demanding $2 billion. I am not hinting at the railway – I am saying directly that it is the property of the Republic of Armenia, and there is no other option.”

For the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia no longer has any clear-cut levers of pressure over Armenia. Those that remain are purely economic. 

With a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan potentially on the horizon and the Armenian-Turkish border set to reopen, Yerevan’s European trajectory is becoming increasingly clear. Notably, Russia is unlikely to be able to do much about it. Once the country rids itself of Moscow's remaining levers of influence in the economy, Armenia will finally be able to make its own independent political choices.

According to OSINT analysts, two Il-976 SKIP aircraft arrived at the Novaya Zemlya archipelago in the second half of August. In addition, an A-50U radar plane, four An-26 military transport aircraft, one An-74D, and several helicopters were spotted at the Rogachevo airbase.

As The Barents Observer notes, this may indicate that Russia is about to begin new tests of the Burevestnik, which is believed to potentially leave a radioactive trace during flight. The outlet also pointed out that a group of ships typically used during missile tests, including for search operations, has been spotted in the Barents and Kara Seas.

Iversen also concludes that Russia is preparing for a missile test. As he told The Insider:

“Everything now seems to be in place for actual flight tests of Burevestnik, conforming to the patterns of the previous test seasons.

With the arrival of the second IL-976, the same number of main support aircraft as in the past are present at Rogachevo: the two IL-976s plus an A-50 Mainstay.

There is a significant number of chartered civilian ships supporting the Burevestnik program, and most of them up there now have also participated in previous years. Yesterday, for the first time this season, they sailed out to positions both east and west of Severny Island, in a pattern I have good confidence on being associated with tests. They are now returning towards Pankovo, and since this was the first time, I think this was a rehearsal / dry run.

As far as I know, there have not been any detections of radiation or nuclides by the Norwegian or other international radiation monitoring networks after the flight tests at Novaya Zemlya. This doesn't mean that Burevestnik doesn't emit a radioactive trail at all, and the wind patterns at the time of a test matter too, when it comes to detecting it.”

The Insider previously reported that Vladimir Putin has made repeated claims that the Burevestnik test was successful. The missile is reported to have no range limitations thanks to its nuclear power unit. By 2019, according to U.S. intelligence and Western analysts, the missile had undergone at least 13 tests, of which only two were considered partially successful. In the West, the Burevestnik has been nicknamed a “tiny flying Chornobyl,” and experts note that it currently poses a bigger threat to Russian residents than to adversaries abroad.

The Burevestnik is commonly linked to an accident at a testing site near Nyonoksa in Arkhangelsk Region in August 2019 — an explosion that killed five Rosatom employees. Two more people —  reportedly military personnel — died later, likely from acute radiation sickness.

Several others received significant doses of radiation, and background radiation levels in the city of Severodvinsk spiked sharply for a time.

In October 2025, Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Valery Gerasimov reported to Putin on a successful test flight of the Burevestnik, saying the missile had stayed airborne for around 15 hours and had covered a distance of 14,000 km. The Defense Ministry did not release any footage of the missile’s flight. The Russian president then announced the completion of the missile’s testing, ordering preparations of the infrastructure for its deployment.

According to Ukrainian military officials, drone experts, and specialists who examined the wreckage, operators had directed the aircraft toward a specific gas station, but during the final stretch of its flight it selected a target independently, using AI. The system was reportedly trained to recognize propane tanks. However, the drone did not reach its intended target, failing to maneuver around a building near the gas station and exploding nearby. The blast killed 19-year-old college student Tetiana Bubynets, 41-year-old Oleksii Svirin, and 48-year-old Roman Karpii.

Kateryna Bondar, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), called the attack the first documented instance in which a Russian drone using an autonomous system caused civilian deaths. Russia had previously tested drones that use AI for independent targeting, but no deaths from such attacks had been reported.

Ukrainian experts had discovered Nvidia Jetson Orin mini-computers in the wreckage of other Russian drones. According to the Ukrainian side, the absence of remote-control antennas on the aircraft, combined with the installed computing modules, was one indication that these drones had operated autonomously. Researchers also stated that they examined unencrypted data on the module and found it to contain images of the terrain and code showing which categories of objects the system had been trained to recognize and attack.

NYT shared photographs of the recovered hardware with Nvidia, and the company confirmed that the images showed its Jetson Orin — a civilian computing module that costs several hundred dollars, designed in particular for robotics and computer vision systems. Nvidia denied selling these components in Russia, but admitted they are widely available through third-party resellers, stating that the manufacturer cannot track the subsequent movement of each device.

This is not the first time a Jetson Orin has been found in Russian weaponry. On Aug. 12, Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence (HUR) reported discovering the same module in a new Russian S-71M Monokhrom cruise missile. According to markings published by Ukrainian intelligence, the Jetson Orin found there was manufactured in March 2025 — after sweeping Western export restrictions against Russia had already been introduced.

As Reuters previously reported, citing U.S. officials, China and Hong Kong remain major transshipment points for the supply of restricted technologies to Russia. According to Ukrainian authorities, about 60% of foreign components found in Russian weapons arrive via China.