July 24 2026 - Day 1,612b - continued

Russia Bombards Ukraine

The “massive” retaliation attack for Ukraine’s strikes against the Wildberries warehouses in Moscow and Tambov came overnight Saturday-Sunday, or more exactly the land strike part. In fact, it turned out to be a substantial, but far from overwhelming and crushing attack, it was a big strike but Kyiv has taken and ridden out worse.

Fires were reported in five city regions. One civilian killed, 15 injured according to early reports. The death was an 89-year-old woman.

The new wrinkles implemented by the Russians this time was a new record in ballistic+ hyper-sonic fired over a small period, with about 40 impacting in about a half hour, mostly in Kyiv. Also, ten hyper-sonic missiles were in the mix which is twice as many as in most strikes in the past. Finally, no cruise missiles. Launches started at about 1:20 A.M. and by about 2:40 A.M. the air battle and strikes were finished.

It seems like the Russians were trying in part to hit the Antonov plant and possibly the Arsenal plant, which they have shot missiles at for years. At least one missile hit and destroyed a factory operated by UKRTAC, who make textile-based military personal equipment like ballistic vest carriers, armored vests, backpacks, camel backs and so forth. Their kit has a great price/quality ratio reputation. Their top-end ensemble will fit out an assault infantryman for a little less than $1,000.

Total for the attack 41 missiles launched. Stats are below, but in general some, but not all the ballistic missiles were shot down, which is excellent performance and pretty good evidence the Ukrainians received more Patriot missiles. I can confirm multiple launches from a location I was observing (noise woke me up) and one intercept for sure, and probably two. That said, all the hyper-sonic missiles got through. This is the future air defense problem the West hasn’t even begun to think about.

Once again the Lukyanovska metro station was hit and the pedestrian underpass leading to one of the entrances was demolished and buried. Some of you will recall Russian missiles leveled an adjacent shopping center in June. Inside the metro some of the ceiling tiles and frame work collapsed. Much dust. This was on the surface by the escalators, no damage to anything properly below ground. Somewhat miraculously the McDonald’s about 20 m. away had only a couple of windows blown out, was open for business in a few hours.

I can’t make this up: Within 72 hours of the strike, without exaggeration as the smell of dust and burnt wood still was in the air, the US blogger/thought leader Laura Loomer appeared in Kyiv and among other peculiar acts recorded selfies of herself eating a Mac w/ cheese in front of the Lukyankivka metro and the demolished shopping center next to it. She told her followers she had for the past two years been the unfortunate victim of evil Russian propaganda, in fact Ukraine is good and Russia is bad, she’s very sorry for misleading people.

This is a woman who in 2022 was on the record as declaring Ukraine a Nazi state, praising Russia for invading Ukraine because it is a good thing to kill Nazis, and that the Kyiv government had been murdering ethnic Russians living in east Ukraine.

That was then. On Wednesday we were treated to Loomer, a self-described non-practicing Jew, telling her followers Putin was evil because he had attacked Jesus Christ (and the Madonna) in Kyiv.

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/80930

After visiting the metro, Laura Loomer interviewed Zelensky personally. She threw him a lot of softball questions. He told her Ukraine will beat up on Russia even worse next year.

There is a nasty theory bouncing around the Ukrainian internet that Loomer was contracted to the Kremlin until about June 2026, at which point her contract ran out and the Kremlin decided not to renew, and now either Loomer decided to burnish her creds with her content consumers by switching loyalties to Ukraine, or, the Ukrainians picked up her contract since the Russians were no longer paying her.

Loomer has said she is in Ukraine on her own initiative in order to bring truth to her followers.

Overnight Sunday-Monday a Russian missile strike burnt Kyiv’s Kinoglav book warehouse. 250,000 volumes destroyed. I know very few people care about books being burned these days because very few people read books. Orwell wrote about that — but of course he wrote it in a book so there are plenty of people who have no idea.

During the day on Friday the Russians fired two missiles at a “sport complex” north of Kyiv, ten killed more than 100 injured. Appeals are going out for blood donations. This was a bad day for some people I know.

continued…