War

by Sonner Kehrt, The War Horse On a late spring day in 1945, a boyish-looking 17-year-old reported to the Naval Station Great Lakes, just north of Chicago. His name was James Ryals, but everyone called him by his middle name, Jerry. Jerry had been so eager to serve that he’d …

Russia has taken control of half or more of the eastern Ukrainian city of Sievierodonetsk that plays a pivotal role in Moscow’s attempt to capture the industrial Donbas region, the city’s mayor and a Ukrainian regional governor acknowledged Tuesday.  Luhansk’s regional governor, Serhiy Gaidai, said that after days of fierce …

Former battlefields around Kyiv are littered with unexploded ordnance, and are too unstable to be fully cleared from the ground, according to a British explosives expert who is helping to disarm the bombs. “It’s too dangerous now to just wander around searching,” said Chris Garrett, a British EOD volunteer who …

Russia could disrupt Finland’s maritime trade, but could not mount a land invasion into the Nordic nation, according to a former top Finish intelligence official.  “The garrisons next to the Finnish border have been emptied,” said Major General Pekka Toveri, the former intelligence chief of the Finnish General Staff. “They …

Has Ukraine been using Russian next-generation Man Portable Air Defense System (MANPADS) units that its forces captured from Vladimir Putin’s army? Sources inside Donbas tell Soldier of Fortune that Ukrainian troops have been seen using the relatively new SA-25 VERBA 9K333 systems, which are believed to be the most advanced …

By Soldier of Fortune correspondent Gatimu Juma Government officials in Mogadishu view the return of U.S. forces to Somalia as a boon to local efforts to fight a resurgent al-Shabaab terror group, sources told Soldier of Fortune. “If all they do is give advice, that’s a tremendous help,” one official …

What military capabilities would Finland and Sweden bring to NATO if the two Nordic countries are accepted into the alliance? Both bring know-how, particularly in terms of operating in cold, austere environments, and in the icy waters of the region. The Swedish Armed Forces Subarctic Warfare Center trains its own …

Tajik authorities say nine people, including a police officer, have been killed in the volatile Gorno-Badakhshan region as the government tries to quell protests sparked by anger over the lack of an investigation into the 2021 death of an activist while in police custody. The Interior Ministry said on May …

The Central African Republic, the second least developed country in the world, has been the scene of a civil war since 2013.

Russia’s campaign in the Donbas region of Ukraine has “lost momentum and fallen significantly behind schedule,” and likely will not accelerate its advance during the next month, according to British military intelligence. “Despite small-scale initial advances, Russia has failed to achieve substantial territorial gains over the past month whilst sustaining …