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With the invasion reaching its fourth week now one really has to wonder what the end game here is from Putin. It is something I have mentioned before however with each day and each bomb launched/dropped there really is less and less for him to capture. With all of the sadness and human catastrophe that has occurred, there have been some moments of humor and another of those has just occurred.
Ukrainian Farmers NFTs
I ran across this comment on Twitter and was able to reach out to someone over in Ukraine who did say it was a serious thing but also meant as a joke to further insult Putin. Countless videos have been seen over the course of the invasion of the Russian vehicles running out of gas and well being towed away by Ukrainian farmers. Well, one farmer who has managed to tow away 3 Russian tanks has listed them as NFTs on ! Contrary to other NFTs these suckers come with the real thing and the coordinates will be relieved with instructions on how to pick up to whoever purchases the tanks!
The farmer even goes on to say that he ethnically sourced his tanks and that no one was hurt or killed in their acquisition so they are not haunted. With a floor price of 150 ETH, they are not cheap by any means but the funds are destined for something that is being really overlooked right now in the war. Ukrainian is a huge wheat and grain exporter and that industry has been decimated by the war. Thus while the farmer selling the tanks has said his number 1 priority is getting his family out of harm's way the funds will be used to restore the agriculture sector since so much machinery has been restored in the conflict already.
Hypersonic Missile Development
Recently it has been more and more openly discussed that Rusia was no longer using its high tech munition and had really started to move to its low tech and not accurate munitions. This is concerning because it means even more civilians will be injured or killed when a rocket misses its target. Russia today though announced something that caught me off-guard. They announced that they had not only deployed but had used its much-talked-about hypersonic missile. Russia stated it used the missile to destroy a munition warehouse in Western Ukraine and the US has confirmed its usage making it the first time that a weapon like this has been used in combat.
It is important to know that while the US has announced usage it has not stated where the attack took place or if it was even successful. Since these types of weapons are brand new and only Russia is confirmed to have them and deployed them it is a rude awakening to the whole world. China and the US are both playing a catch-up game with these systems and while they are making strides to catch up the crown right now appears to be fully in Russia's hands. No country in the world Russia included has a weapons defense system that is really capable of defending from hypersonic weapon attacks so if Russia has a ton of these and they work as stated it could be a huge issue for Ukraine.
For the last 4 weeks, the Russians have tried to seize this city to make a land bridge to Crimea however they continue to fail to capture it. This city has been the victim of human atrocities that are indescribable. In the last couple of weeks, one of the city's maternity wards was bombed. Then last week a theater where civilians have taken shelter from aerial attacks was struck. What was so appalling about this attack was that in large letters in front of and behind the building was the word children in Russian to signal it was sheltering civilians.
At the time the number of people housed in the theater was between 800-1,300 and for hours after the attack, no one emerged. Since then a total of 130 people have emerged and while the bomb shelter is believed to be intact rescuers are struggling to get to anyone there. Russian bombs have been falling nonstop around the clock preventing any meaningful progress. With the artillery, bombs, and missiles leveling large areas of the city ground troops have begun moving in after countless failed attempts. While not a lot is publically known about it reports have emerged that street fighting has begun. This does not mean the city is under threat of falling soon as Kharkiv has shown it is an important development to watch.
While hundreds of thousands have evacuated Kyiv, Mariupol, and Ukraine as a whole there has also been a huge influx of those who had fled returning. According to Ukraine over 200,000 citizens have returned since the invasion to pick up arms to train and fight. The Foreign Legion as well has numbers around 20,000 and these individuals are required to have had previous live combat experience to be able to serve. In Kyiv in particular while cars leaving continued today there were also cars pouring into the city with people ready to fight and defend the city. When this is combined with the recently sent arms from the West, Ukraine has a considerable amount of backing which is leading to Russia not accomplishing much. If Slovenia does send its S-300 system to Ukraine this could further tilt the war in Ukraine's favor as they are able to better protect against jet and missile attacks.
Final Thoughts
As has become the norm a lot is still unclear when it comes to the next few days and what all could happen. Ukraineian counter attacks have been proven to be a huge issue for Russia as they leave their supply lines wide open almost daring someone to attack them. In the south actually it appears that the counter attacks have successfully driven the Russians out of some areas and back towards Crimea along the southwest area that is. Mariupol while surrounded has been able to get civilians out the last two days which is huge.
In the two other major cities Kyiv and Kharkiv the Russians have completely failed to even surround the city and seem to have abandoned the idea for now. Instead they are just shelling and shelling and shelling the cities almost like they have decided to bomb it until their is nothing left. Mykolaiv a port city between Kherson and Odessa was expected to fall two weeks ago while the opposite had happened. Russians quickly made gains but even in the city of Kherson which they have control over it is not like their equipment is safe. A couple of days ago Ukrainians destroyed several Russian helicopters at the "secure" Kherson Internaitional Airport in the middle of the night showing how unsafe it still is and how Ukraine is able to operate in areas under Russian control.
