The first is this breaking news over the last few hours. The good news is that the Russians hit an incoming missile. The air defense crew should be given a medal; the bad news is the civilian casualties.
Just like we complain of those in Ukraine or other conflicts, civilians should not be in the line of fire. However, civilians should not be this close to a military target, especially when vacationing. They were not the targets. That’s the difference between Russia and Ukraine. The former put them there on purpose. Read on:
While military experts argue about what Russian air defense tried to shoot down five Ukrainian ATACMS, let’s look at where the one that was shot down over Uchkuevka beach was flying. And he was flying to the location of the 1096th anti-aircraft missile regiment of the Black Sea Fleet. The regiment’s headquarters and office are located 863 meters in a straight line from the beach.
Is the location of the regiment a military purpose — absolutely yes. Is it necessary to close a beach located less than a kilometer from an air defense regiment, and even during the war and in the front-line zone? Yes. But the beach was open, like other beaches in Sevastopol and Crimea. The Russian Federation is not waging a war, they have a special operation there, a tourist season and “vacationers”.
Local residents complain that the warning system did not work. Simply put, the air raid signal was not turned on. In the last two months, the warning system has generally been working poorly, and most often is silent. Because in April, May and early June, the Ukrainian Armed Forces, with attacks on radar stations, long-range target detection stations and air defense facilities in Crimea, turned this very air defense system from a system into a set of disparate weapons. A particular “Pantsir” fixed the target on approach and fired at it where it managed to catch it. It is useless to turn on the air raid signal after this, because it is too late. And Russian air defense is no longer able to detect targets earlier.
The striking elements of the Russian air defense missile and the Ukrainian ATACMS killed 5 and wounded 152 people.
@Volyamedia
So, the local authorities kept that beach open. It was meant to make any targeting decision more difficult. It’s a balance between valid military targets and, in this case, potential human shields. They were not purposely targeted.
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