cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/5954308
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In 2014, Lemeshchenko moved from the Russian city of Voronezh to Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine with her husband and son. … In the spring of 2024, the athlete underwent training in shooting, drone control, and the manufacture of explosives in Kyiv. She then traveled to Russia via third countries. In October, Lemeshchenko blew up power line towers near St. Petersburg, and then monitored Colonel Alexei Loboda, the commander of an airbase in Voronezh, who is linked to the bombing of Kharkiv. The saboteur was arrested in January 2025. Lemeshchenko did not deny the facts of the charges, but said that she did not consider herself guilty “from a moral point of view.”
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Here is the closing statement of Yulia Lemeshchenko in court.
As you can see, I don’t have any notes, I haven’t really prepared, but I think I’ll improvise. I will probably repeat some of the things I have already said during the hearings, but let this be a kind of summary in a general monologue.
So, as I’ve already said, in any war, there is a clash between sides, and each side defends its own truth, its own justice. I’ve taken a side. I am not a citizen of the country I have decided to fight for. Nevertheless, I consider Ukraine my home. I love this country, I love Kharkiv infinitely.
There‘s a district in Kharkiv called North Saltivka. About 500,000 people lived there, half a million. Some of my acquaintances lived there, including my hairdresser. After Russian shelling and bombing, not a single building in this district remains intact. Not a single one. I’m not just talking about broken windows—I’m talking about entire parts of buildings that have collapsed.
There were explosions right next to my house. My neighbor Anya lived on the first floor with her four-year-old son Nikita. A shell exploded right under their windows, under the first floor. The apartment was completely destroyed. I don’t know what happened to Anya and her son Nikita. I still don’t know if they are alive or not.
In this war, I lost friends, one relative—my second cousin—and my colleagues. War is terrible. I couldn’t just stand by and watch. In any war, people who find themselves involved in it either try to fight or run away. I don’t know, maybe they run away because of cowardice or weakness. I don’t consider myself a cowardly or weak person. I decided to fight against this—against Russian military aggression.
Perhaps what I’m saying is making my situation worse, but my honor and conscience are more important to me. I did what I thought was necessary within my power. Regret, remorse—well, maybe on my deathbed. But for now, everything is as it is. That’s it, I have nothing more to add. Thank you.
You’ll find more information on the linked site.
I honestly don’t get why Russia is still in Ukraine. They can’t win the war in the long run. Once it became apparent they couldn’t easily topple the government in Kyiv and ended up killing too many civilians, it was over. Entirely unsurpring, but dead children are an excellent recruitment tool.
Even if Russia conquers the entirety of Ukraine tomorrow, which it won’t, that’s just the first phase. Then it’s an Afghanistan style occupation and insurgency. Insurgent attack, predictable overreaction and civilian deaths, even more angry Ukrainians and Europeans, more attacks, even greater overreaction, even more terrorist attacks.
A kalashnikov costs 100 euros. Bombs cost less. Europe and the Ukrainian diaspora can fund an insurrection for the next thousand years. And it’s not as if there’s a sea border between Ukraine and Russia. You can’t easily tell Ukrainians from Russians either. Plus they can expect the shit to hit the fan in the Caucusus sooner rather than later. Especially with a bit of foreign funding.
Oh well, suppose it’ll make a good example of the sunk cost fallacy one day.
They already installed loyal government in USA and are trying to do the same with the key EU players. Ukraine will lose without support. Support costs a lot. It grows unrest that ends up in russian-funded far-rights getting to power.
Democracy is a double-edged sword.
Russia’s not making the decisions, Putin is. And Putin’s not trying to “win.” I’m sure it would have been nice, but the process is not victory, it is teaching the lesson that if anyone crosses him, even an entire country, he’ll fuck them up and no one will stop him. Same as the US in Vietnam or Nicaragua.
That’s why his proxies make such a big deal about how threatening it was for Ukraine to join NATO: He said they weren’t allowed, but they did anyway (or at least theoretically thought about it), so now he’s killing their children, their fathers and brothers. And in his apologists’ minds, that logic makes perfect sense. The question of whether Ukraine was “allowed” to make overtures to the West is relevant to them. The question of whether Putin was “allowed” is bizarre and contradictory. Of course he’s allowed. He can kill whoever he wants. It is the privilege.
In geopolitics as in personal interactions, his approach is not really a “winning” strategy. You will drive away friends and allies, pursue “victories” that cost you and the people close to you far more than anyone gains. just a miserable way to live. It “works,” in a way, if you’re used to terrible dangerous situations and have developed a kind of trauma response that means you have to hurt and destroy everyone around you so they don’t hurt you first, but it doesn’t even really “work” in the sense of keeping you safe. It’s a lot safer to have friends. Easier, too.
But that’s not what he did. So now he and about a million Russian soldiers are experiencing the result. He can’t stop, or he’ll look weak, but he also can’t win, so he just gets up every day and talks with people who unanimously lie to him, moves from place to place in identical set up offices so no one will figure out where he is and move in to kill him, obsesses over what happens to dictators who can’t stay on the horse. I’m sure he’s afraid. He knows history, he knows how this ends, but he’s boxed in now. Anywhere in the world he goes, anything he tries to do, he’ll always be scared about his food, scared about anything he drinks. He has to stay in the match, he has to keep getting up and trying again. He has to stay on top, no matter what, and he’s getting older, and the horse is bucking a little more with every year.
And, like poor Victor, he still has hell to look forward to.