How the international media covered the Russo-Ukrainian war, May 19

While there have been multiple reports that Russian cyberattacks have not been as successful as expected, Business Insider writes that it might be different. The outlet focuses on the cyberweapon against American satellite Viasat, launched by Russian hackers hours before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24. The AcidRain cyberweapon is a malware that targeted Viasat modems and routers erasing all their data before permanently disabling them. The goal of this attack was to disrupt Ukrainian military command but it resulted in an outsized impact on a large number of ground satellite communications outside Ukraine. This means Russia has capacities to launch a cyber Armageddon, but it has not done this so far. There might be a number of reasons for this but the main one is that Kremlin might want to keep intelligence sources functioning. When the hackers destroy the node, it can’t provide intelligence data anymore.

The Telegraph published a stunning piece featuring Ukrainians who have become collateral damage of the Russian invasion. Photographer Emilio Morenatti, an amputee himself, travelled to Ukraine to meet, photograph, and talk to Ukrainians, who have suffered from Russian missiles. Emilio lost his leg following the work he has been doing in Afghanistan, and that is when he felt connected to many other people with similar experiences worldwide. He writes it was not easy to find heroes for his photo project, as most of the injured are in the military hospitals or evacuated to other countries. Eventually, Emilio found a hospital in Kyiv, where doctors and patients were eager to share their stories with the world. The article tells stories of civilian adults and children who have lost their limbs to the Kremlin’s attacks.

A group of international relations and defense experts wrote an opinion column regarding the role of Intelligence on War on the Rocks. According to the authors, the Russo-Ukrainian war provides a case study of how successful Ukrainian and allies’ contrary to weak Russian intelligence efforts look like. According to the column, Russian intelligence culture is based on the will to provide overly optimistic information. The column cites Bellingcat, according to which Putin fired over 150 intelligence officers including the Federal Security Service’s Fifth Service chief, Gen. Sergei Beseda, who earlier provided unreliable information about Ukraine. A key failure of the operational intelligence of the Kremlin is a weak communication system, easily intercepted by counterparts. On the contrary, Ukrainian intelligence demonstrated a smart approach, with two key factors: the willingness of Western allies to share intelligence and the increased potential of open-source intelligence. In the conclusion section, the column writes “Ukraine’s defense is certain to go down in intelligence history as one of the clearest studies of success in contrast to Russia’s failures”.