This Week On An Angry Planet, Jan. 6, 2023

Russia put hypersonic missiles in the sea, the U.S. sent (not tanks) to Ukraine, and El Chapo Jr. in the crossfire.

The first thing you must know this week is that Peter Gabriel, former lead singer of Genesis, has released his first single in six years. It’s a song about the joys of open-source intelligence gathering called ‘Panopticom.’ The singer has said it was inspired, in part, by organizations such as Bellingcat.

Ukraine

Moscow called for a 36-hour cease-fire to coincide with the celebration of Eastern Orthodox Christmas on Jan. 7. Kyiv rejected the truce and Russia later claimed Ukraine had violated the cease-fire, despite never having agreed to it in the first place.

On New Year’s Day, a precision strike hit a Russian position in the occupied town of Makiivka in Donetsk. It appears a HIMARS was involved in the attack and the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) claimed the attack killed 63 people and wounded more. Ukraine’s MoD put the numbers at 300 dead and 400 wounded.

The attack exposed a rift in Russia. The Russian MoD claimed on Telegram that the strike happened because Russian soldiers had cell phones that allowed Ukraine to geolocate them and target the position. Russian military bloggers and supporters pushed back on this online and blamed Russian field commanders for the screw up. Howard Altman at The War Zone has the best reporting on this back and forth.