By John Helmer, Moscow
@bears_with
The daily record of Russian drone and missile strikes across the Ukraine shows not only an escalation in the scale and firepower of the electric war but also a new strategy of targeting designed by the General Staff.
The lead image shows the launch and strike points on the battlefield map which have been identified in the Ukrainian reporting over the evening of October 21-22.
“In response to Ukraine’s terrorist attacks on civilian targets in Russia,” the Defense Ministry bulletin, issued in Moscow on the afternoon of October 22, has reported, “the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation launched a massive strike tonight [October 21-22] with high-precision long-range ground- and air-based weapons, including Kinzhal hypersonic aeroballistic missiles, as well as unmanned aerial vehicles at energy infrastructure facilities which support the operation of the military-industrial complex of Ukraine. The targets of the strike have been achieved; all designated targets have been hit.”
From Kiev the impact of the strikes on the loss of electricity and the duration of power outages has been confirmed officially. The blackout in the eastern regions of the country now extends from early morning to late evening. “Ukraine was forced to introduce electricity shutdown schedules in 12 regions, Minister of Energy Svetlana Hrynchuk said on Thursday…Energy workers are forced to apply hourly shutdown schedules in 12 regions of Ukraine, the minister said. According to her, the restrictions will be from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. ‘Depending on how quickly the repair and restoration work is completed, we will adjust the schedules and hope that the burden on Ukrainians will be less,’ Hrynchuk noted. ‘Today, the enemy again attacked energy facilities purposefully, primarily in such regions as Sumy region and Chernigov region; there was also certain damage in Dnipropetrovsk region and Kharkov region,’ the minister said.”
“The General Staff goal appears to be blackout east of the Dnieper and excess or lack of power generation in the west,” comments an expert source; he is an electrical engineer and veteran of NATO electric war campaigns. “If the Ukrainians can’t make up for the generation losses in the east via transfers from the west — which they won’t be able to do as the switch stations and transmission lines are being destroyed — then it’s black-out in Dniepropetrovsk, Chernigov, Poltava, Sumy, and Kharkov. West of the Dnieper River, this could create a situation where the Kiev government will be forced to shut down reactors. The reason is that generating too much electricity can be almost as bad as not generating enough in terms of the effect on frequency. ”
“Another possibility is that the Ukrainians are being forced into desperate measures such as emergency power transfers to the east. This can be detected in jury-rigging of high voltage tie-ins; not having the protection elements properly coordinated; reliance on damaged or dodgy switchgear. Combined, these factors are causing a cascading power losses in the east and west of the country, or at least parts of it.”
Parallel analyses reported by other sources confirm that “Russia is employing a new tactic aimed at completely disabling the energy system on the left bank of the Dnipro. This is creating an imbalance in power supply between western and eastern Ukraine: a critical electricity shortage is emerging in the east due to the destruction of thermal and hydroelectric plants, while a surplus of energy is present in the west, where nuclear power plants operate. This surplus cannot be effectively transferred eastward due to limited grid capacity.”
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