I did not see any mention of this incident in the lamestream press, the fault perhaps being my limited search for a few hours, or maybe nothing was reported. But on May 23 Russia's Armavir Radar Station in southwestern Russia was "substantially damaged" by Ukrainian drones. This station was used to track incoming missiles from the Middle East, and thus is an early warning installation system. Its disabling by drone attack leaves a gap in Russia's defence as noted: "The two Voronezh-DMs at the facility are a key part of Russia's larger strategic early warning network and their loss, even temporarily, could only degrade the country's ability to detect incoming nuclear threats. There are also concerns about how this could impact the ability of Russia's overall strategic warning network to evaluate potential threats and eliminate false positives due to possible loss of overlapping coverage in certain areas.
Beyond that, it has been pointed out that the attack on Armavir could meet the conditions the Russian government laid out publicly in 2020 for actions that could trigger a nuclear retaliatory strike. Russia's early warning network is part of the country's broader nuclear deterrent posture."
While it is ironic that a key early warning system could be take out in this way, the worry is that these sorts of attack could at some point push the Russians to the breaking point, leading to nuclear missiles being launched. Clearly the emerging policy of having attacks deep withing Russia is prodding he bear with a red-hot poker. Retaliation will come at some point.
https://michaeltsnyder.substack.com/p/the-western-media-being-strangely
"One of Russia's most important early warning radar installations that was designed to track incoming nuclear missiles was destroyed on May 23rd, but the big corporate news outlets in the western world are hardly saying anything about it. Without that installation, there is a giant hole in Russia's ability to track incoming missiles from the direction of the Middle East. So this is a really big deal. During an all-out nuclear war, early warning radar installations would be among the very first targets, and the Russians are telling us that according to their nuclear protocols the destruction of the Armavir Radar Station could have allowed them to conduct a nuclear strike in return. Thankfully, that did not happen. But this should have been front page news all over the world.
It is being reported that the Armavir Radar Station in southwestern Russia was "substantially damaged" by Ukrainian drones on Thursday…
Satellite imagery confirms a Russian strategic early warning radar site in the southwestern end of the country was substantially damaged in a reported Ukrainian drone attack earlier this week. This looks to be a first-of-its-kind attack on a site linked to Russia's general strategic defense. As such, it points to a new and worrisome dimension to the conflict, especially when it comes to the potential use of nuclear weapons.
A satellite image taken on May 23 that The War Zone obtained from Planet Labs of the Armavir Radar Station in Russia's southwestern Krasnodar Krai shows significant debris around one of the site's two Voronezh-DM radar buildings. These are ultra-high-frequency (UHF) over-the-horizon (OTH) radars that are part of Russia's nuclear ballistic missile early warning system.
There were two Voronezh-DM units at that particular location, and it appears that both of them are now inoperable, and it is likely to stay that way for quite some time…
What can be seen in the satellite image aligns with pictures taken from ground level that emerged on social media earlier today, which show severe damage to both structures housing the Voronezh-DMs at Armavir. There is also clear evidence of multiple hits on the radar buildings. It is worth noting that radar arrays are generally very sensitive and fragile systems, and even relatively limited damage can result in a "mission kill," rendering them inoperable for an extended period of time.
The Armavir Radar Station is highly advanced, and in 2013 Russian President Vladimir Putin bragged that it could detect "even the most inconspicuous target in fractions of a second, detecting launches of various types of missiles, hundreds and even thousands of kilometers from our borders".
If someone hit an early warning radar installation in the U.S., all of our military officials would be really freaking out right now.
But because this happened in Russia, everyone is acting as if nothing of significance just happened.
Of course the truth is that the Ukrainians were very foolish to attack this facility, because we are being told that this attack was enough to "meet the conditions the Russian government laid out publicly in 2020 for actions that could trigger a nuclear retaliatory strike"…
The two Voronezh-DMs at the facility are a key part of Russia's larger strategic early warning network and their loss, even temporarily, could only degrade the country's ability to detect incoming nuclear threats. There are also concerns about how this could impact the ability of Russia's overall strategic warning network to evaluate potential threats and eliminate false positives due to possible loss of overlapping coverage in certain areas.
Beyond that, it has been pointed out that the attack on Armavir could meet the conditions the Russian government laid out publicly in 2020 for actions that could trigger a nuclear retaliatory strike. Russia's early warning network is part of the country's broader nuclear deterrent posture.
In fact, Dmitry Rogozin is publicly acknowledging that it is quite true that the Russians could have used nuclear weapons to respond to this attack…
The former head of the state company Roscosmos and now a senator of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Rogozin, reported that the Ukrainian Forces attacked an installation of the Russian Missile Attack Warning System (MSWS) in the Krasnodar Territory.
This is a key element of the Battle Command System of the country's strategic nuclear forces.
The senator reports that as a result of the strike, the Kuban early warning system facility was damaged.
"In effect, this means that Russia has the right to consider this attack as a global threat to its state and national security, which, according to our doctrine, allows(!) the use of nuclear weapons(!) in response .
At the same time, it is not entirely clear who made this essentially irrational decision," writes Rogozin.
I wish that I could get everyone to understand how serious this is.
Here in the United States, the possibility of nuclear war isn't even an issue and to most Americans it is so unlikely that it isn't even worth thinking about.
But over in Russia, national leaders are talking about nuclear war all the time and it is a constant topic on news shows.
If the Russians consider their national existence to be seriously threatened, they will use nuclear weapons.
And it certainly does not help that western politicians keep talking about how they will carve up Russia after they help the Ukrainians win the war. Here is one of the latest examples…
Last week, Russian media took note of the latest provocative statements by Estonia's Prime Minister Kaja Kallas. She has led Russia's tiny Baltic neighbor into a firm hawkish anti-Moscow position. The country was part of the wave of eastern European nations to join NATO in the mid-2000s during the Bush era.
She's calling for the breakup of the Russian Federation. Kallas proposed during a debate in the country's capital of Tallinn last week that Russia could become much "smaller" as a desired outcome of the Ukraine war.
"Russia's defeat is not a bad thing because then you know there could really be a change in society," the prime minister told the 17th Lennart Meri Conference, as translated in Russia's RT.
She said that currently the Russian Federation can actually be seen as making up "many different nations" and that they could be naturally broken into separate states.
This is what the globalists intend to do, and the Russians realize this.
And the Russians will do whatever it takes to prevent that from happening."