As with all things Ukraine, when the initial reports of the Russian cruise missile attack against the military training facility located near the border with Poland, we said to be cautious about western reporting of no NATO military personnel present, killed or injured.
The reason is for the warning was simple – if NATO is providing weapons and training, they’ve got to be doing the distribution and training somewhere in Ukraine near the NATO border. Conduct war operations in a war zone, and you run the risk of war outcomes.
Now the Daily Mail is beginning to report on ‘missing, feared dead’ former British special forces operators likely killed in the blast. As the story evolves, how long will it be before U.S. headlines carry similar missing U.S. “contractor” stories?
Most of the U.S. and NATO warfighting is carried out by independent contractors or mercenary groups now. Ukraine is the perfect battlespace for that unofficial type of war fighter engagement.
(Daily Mail) – Three British former special forces soldiers are feared to have been killed in a Russian airstrike near the Polish border. More than 30 Russian cruise missiles targeted the Yavoriv base yesterday, killing as many as 180 people.
Igor Konashenkov, a spokesman for Russia’s ministry of defence, said the base was struck by ‘long-range, high-precision’ weapons because it was hosting ‘foreign mercenaries and a large shipment of foreign weapons’.




…”Strategic success in the 21st century is not about a physical land grab of territory; that’s what Putin has done. In this century, strategic power is increasingly measured and exercised by economic strength, by technological sophistication and your story – who you are, what your values are; can you attract ideas and talent and goodwill? And on each of those measures, this will be a failure for Russia.”