War

1498th day. The Russian military is equipping drones with reinforcement to pierce the wings of Ukrainian drones in the air

Since February 24, 2022, Meduza has been broadcasting live about the Russian-Ukrainian war. We publish your letters every day because we are sure that we need to continue talking about the war. Share with us your thoughts about the war. What feelings are you experiencing? How does war affect your life and your attitude towards the world? If you have a story related to the war, tell it . The feedback form is at the end of this article. A review of the previous day can be read here .

Russia

The Russian military is using unconventional tactics to combat Ukrainian drones, The Telegraph writes . Russian drones are equipped with fittings and ram Ukrainian ones during flight.

A few days ago, a video of one such attack was widely circulated on Russian military channels. Footage taken from a Russian drone shows him flying up to a Ukrainian drone and piercing its body with two metal rods.

Such cases are not isolated. Back in early March, the Ukrainian military published photographs of a Backfire attack drone attacked by a Russian interceptor - a trident, homemade from rebar and nails, was stuck in its wing.

That Ukrainian drone was able to successfully return to base. As the military themselves assumed , this happened due to the structural strength of this type of drone.

However, to reduce costs, the wings of some Ukrainian drones are made of polystyrene or foam - they are quite easy to puncture. In theory, the main advantage of such ramming tactics - compared to the use of explosives - is the potential for the interceptor drone to be reused after a successful attack.

However, in reality, say experts interviewed by The Telegraph, these advantages are not so obvious - most hits probably still lead to damage to the interceptor drone itself. A direct hit like the one shown in the video is more difficult to achieve than, for example, detonating a grenade close to the target.

The Telegraph notes that as drone technology develops, both sides are increasingly experimenting with cheap, primitive know-how that can disable enemy drones.

World

The Ukrainian authorities need to make a decision “today” on the withdrawal of troops from Donbass, said Russian Presidential Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov. Thus, he commented on Vladimir Zelensky’s statements about the deadline for the delivery of the region.

Yesterday, Zelensky said that as part of the negotiation process, Moscow allegedly told US representatives that it was giving Kyiv two months to withdraw its troops. “They tell the American side: now there are new deadlines - in two months they will seize the east of our state, they will seize Donbass. And so Ukraine has two months to leave. And then the war will end,” Zelensky said.

According to the Ukrainian president, Russia insists that if there is no withdrawal of troops, it will still seize Donbass “and then there will be other conditions.”

Today Peskov said that “it’s not a matter of two months.” From his words it follows that Moscow considers the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the region a prerequisite for peace and insists that this must happen as soon as possible.

Zelensky must decide today that Ukrainian troops leave the territory of Donbass and go beyond the administrative borders of the Donetsk People's Republic. This has been said several times. And in theory, Zelensky should have made such a decision yesterday.

According to Peskov, the retreat of the Ukrainian Armed Forces from Donbass “could make it possible to stop the hot phase of this war.”

The territorial issue is a key one in the negotiations taking place between Russia, Ukraine and the United States. In February, Zelensky stated that Ukraine, in theory, is ready to withdraw troops from the part of Donbass under its control - but only if Russia withdraws its troops to the same distance.

War in photographs. Bucha

Four years ago, it became known about the massacres that the Russian military committed in Bucha. According to the Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine, the bodies of 358 dead were found in the city after the retreat of Russian troops, most of them civilians.

Yesterday, mourning events were held in Bucha, attended by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrei Sibiga and the foreign ministers of more than 30 European countries. “The butch is a symbol of Russian atrocities, but it also testifies to Ukrainian resilience. It was from here that the liberation of our lands began four years ago,” Sibiga said .

War through the eyes of Meduza readers

How we choose letters

Meduza's readers live in different countries and have different attitudes towards the war. We publish your letters to see this event through your eyes. Our editors try to present all points of view, even if they do not coincide with the editorial position. However, in accordance with the Meduza code, we do not publish messages that contain “hate speech,” justify the murder of civilians, or express direct support for an aggressive war.

Marina (Russia) . The war began when I was 19, I was in my second year at university and was essentially a child. Before and at the beginning of the war, I actively went to rallies, trying to open the eyes of everyone around me to the fact that what was happening around would not lead to anything good and something needed to be done, at least small actions, somehow.

Now I’m 23, I’ve lost my family, I’ve been recovering from depression for four years, and my whole life and youth seem absolutely meaningless to me. I hate our government and I understand that as a Russian citizen I am hated by the people who are hit by Russian missiles every day.

Neither my relatives nor my parents have ever provided for me, I can’t go anywhere because I can’t give up the job that feeds me and calmly socialize in another country. I literally don’t have the energy or money for this.

I don’t believe that this will ever end and that the world will ever come to its senses, but I continue to love people, accept different opinions and try to survive. But I no longer see the point in such a life, I don’t want to live in a country where on every corner there is a zietnik/war criminal traumatized by war and hatred. I don't want to condemn my children to the same suffering. And in general, I don’t see a single safe corner of the earth where I can not think about the fact that one day a piece of a rocket or a drone will fall from the sky and deprive me or my loved ones of life.

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