© Karen Pulfer Focht, via Reuters
“Better to leave than to face the truth.” This is how former Ukrainian Foreign Minister Volodymyr Ohryzko explains US President Donald Trump’s behavior at the G7 summit on Ukraine, Hromadske reports.
Trump left the 2025 G7 Summit a day earlier than planned. At the event, he suggested that the war in Ukraine might have been avoided if Russia had not been expelled from the G7 in 2014. The next day, Russia launched one of the largest terrorist attacks on Kyiv, killing 14 civilians and striking residential houses.
“He has nothing to say to Zelenskyy. He can’t find a single argument to justify his defense of Putin. This is one of those situations where it’s easier to just leave,” the diplomat explains.
According to Ohryzko, all Ukraine can expect from Trump right now is weapons sales and intelligence sharing. Genuine support must come from Europe, but only if European leaders stop “being afraid of their own shadow.”
What happened in Ukraine today is yet another reproach to our European partners, he says.
“We need French or German fighter jets to shoot down missiles over Ukraine — just like the US shoots down Iranian missiles over Israel,” the diplomat adds.
He emphasizes that such action would not drag NATO into the war, as it would be an act of defense, not aggression.
“There isn’t a Russian sitting on every missile. These are aerial weapons flying into the territory of a country friendly to France, so they should be shot down,” he says.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy must raise this issue directly with allies during his visit to Canada, in his view.
“The question must be put bluntly. I believe Zelenskyy has to do it today, in Canada,” he concludes.
On 17 June, Ukraine’s capital and other cities were subjected to sheer terror. Russia deployed its every available aerial weapon to strike Kyiv, Odesa, and Zaporizhzhia, including hypersonic Kinzhal missiles, Kalibrs, cruise and ballistic missiles, and Shahed drones.
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The UK’s Defense Ministry reports in its intelligence update a dramatic increase in the number of artificial limbs issued in Russia, suggesting rising battlefield injuries and growing strain on the country’s medical services.
Open-source data cited by the Ministry’s 17 June update points to a 53% increase in artificial limbs issued in Russia in 2024 compared to the previous year. The figures, reportedly sourced from Russia’s Ministry of Labor, indicate that around 152,500 prosthetic limbs were provided to individuals with disabilities last year. Notably, arm prosthetics saw a 75% surge in issuance. During the same period, wheelchair distribution also climbed by 18%, reflecting a broader rise in mobility-related disability cases.
The update referred to earlier reporting by the independent Russian media outlet Verstka. According to that report, Russian soldiers with amputated limbs had been left waiting for extended periods before receiving necessary prosthetics.
UK Defense Intelligence assessed that Russia is “almost certainly failing to provide necessary combat medical treatment at the front line.” The update noted that this failure contributes to “a greater number of serious long-term injuries amongst Russian soldiers.” It also stated that the significant rise in the number of Russian men with disabilities, along with other wounded personnel, “will almost certainly have a detrimental long-term impact on both medical and social services in Russia.”
© Peter Catterall/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Ukrainian intelligence operatives destroyed an electrical substation in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad on 14 June, cutting power to military and industrial facilities in the surrounding area.
The HUR carried out the operation at approximately 4 a.m. local time. Agents drained cooling fluid from a power transformer at the industrial substation before igniting it, sources told the Ukrainian news outlets Hromadske and Ukrainska Pravda.
The resulting fire damaged the transformer and disrupted electricity supply to nearby Russian enterprises, including facilities belonging to the country’s military-industrial complex and armed forces. A HUR source estimated the financial damage from the sabotage at nearly $5 million.
“Russia no longer has a rear, neither in the east, nor in the west, nor at any point on the planet. Russian assets involved in the war against Ukraine will burn, sink and be destroyed regardless of protection level or location,” the HUR source said, according to Hromadske.
Neither Russian authorities nor local officials have publicly confirmed the power outage or provided details about the incident’s impact on regional infrastructure.
On 1 June, Ukraine also conducted a surprise drone operation, called Spiderweb, destroying or damaging 41 Russian military planes on four key airfields, with damage estimated at over $7 billion. It involved launching 117 first-person view (FPV) drones that were smuggled into Russia and hidden in trucks. The operation took 18 months to plan and execute.
Ukrainian officials report that Russia is expanding its presence and influence across Africa through educational programs and youth initiatives designed to cultivate political leaders and “cultural elite” favorable to Moscow.
According to Andrii Yusov, a representative of Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate, Russia maintains government-funded university quotas specifically for African students. The programs focus on agriculture, engineering, education, and medicine, with students receiving state-sponsored education in Russian institutions.
“African education and sports are increasingly being used by the aggressor state as instruments of hybrid influence aimed at forming a new generation of political and managerial elites loyal to the Kremlin,” Yusov stated.
The intelligence assessment indicates that Russia plans to establish Russian language courses at major African universities alongside professional development programs for local educators. The long-term objective involves synchronizing African educational curricula with Russian Federation standards.
This educational strategy represents part of what Ukrainian officials describe as an effort to embed Russian perspectives within African education systems permanently.
Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation also reported that Russia utilized celebrations of poet Alexander Pushkin’s birthday to advance its influence campaign. Events marking the occasion occurred in several African capitals on 11 June, organized by Rossotrudnichestvo, Russia’s state agency for international cooperation.
According to the Center, these cultural events served dual purposes. While featuring poetry recitations and Russian language instruction, the gatherings also included anti-Western messaging and justifications for Russian foreign policy decisions.
“‘Pushkin days’ are just a façade that Russia uses to cover its true intentions of increasing its influence in Africa. By holding such events, Russia presents itself as a supposedly powerful country with a great culture, while simultaneously fostering a negative perception of the ‘collective West,'” the Center writes.
On 12 June, hacker groups InformNapalm and Militant Intelligence released several leaked documents obtained from JSC Russian Helicopters—a major Russian helicopter manufacturing company. According to the groups, they obtained all of the company’s international contracts, supply routes, and payment documents of the company revealing extensive foreign cooperation with Russia’s defense sector.
InformNapalm stated that the cyber operation coincided with Russia’s national holiday.
“Today, 12 June, the terrorist state celebrates ‘Russia Day’,” the group wrote.
The leak was described as symbolic “greetings with a noose” for Russia, meant to expose the vulnerabilities of its military-industrial complex.
InformNapalm denounced the White House’s currently consistent weak stance towards Moscow, pointing out that the US Cyber Command halted cyber operations against Russia during Donald Trump’s presidency. As a result, the group said, “volunteers and enthusiasts” now carry out cyber operations against Russian targets.
The report says that the cyberattack was part of a broader campaign labeled OpsHackRussia’sDay, which, according to the hackers, targeted a network of Russian corporations tied to the defense industry. JSC Russian Helicopters, a holding that unites all Russian helicopter manufacturers, is among the breached entities. The company operates under Oboronprom, itself a subsidiary of the state-owned conglomerate Rostec.
“As a result of the hack, [JSC Russian Helicopters’] all international contracts, supply routes, bank receipts, accounts from India and other countries were exposed, including embassy archives and Ministry of Defense documents,” InformNapalm wrote.
Documents reportedly mention India, Egypt, Algeria, Indonesia, Laos, Cuba, Kenya, and Uganda. The leaked content includes full detail on tenders, clients, correspondence, staffing schedules, travel routes, banking relations, and coordination with the Russian Ministry of Industry and Trade.
Among the disclosed data, Egypt is named as a logistics hub for Mi-17V-5 maintenance, while Bulgaria appears in supply chain and repair cooperation schemes, according to the report. Other nations named include Azerbaijan and North Macedonia. The documents mention entities like RAWAN HANS in India and detail procurement pathways through Algeria and Indonesia, often using third-country routes.
The publication claims the leak will lead to serious disruptions:
“This release will bring major problems to their defense sector and expose their international customers and partners who tried to stay hidden.”
The group anticipates “contract terminations, sanctions tightening, and global scandals.”
According to InformNapalm, part of the obtained information is already in use for Ukraine’s defense, and more data will be published over time.
Swedish company Saab and German defense startup Helsing have conducted combat trials of a Gripen E fighter jet piloted by artificial intelligence, pitted against a real-life human pilot, The War Zone reports.
The first of these test flights took place on 28 May. By the third combat sortie on 3 June, the AI agent, dubbed Centaur, was ready to engage in a beyond-visual-range (BVR) air battle against a crewed Gripen D fighter.
During the process, the AI agent rapidly accumulated experience and improved its decision-making skills in BVR combat, a battlefield Saab describes as “like playing chess in a supersonic with advanced missiles.”
Saab has confirmed that the Centaur AI system could potentially be expanded to close-range dogfights within visual range (WVR) as well. However, the initial focus remains on BVR engagements, which the company describes as the most critical aspect of air combat, a point reinforced by the ongoing air war in Ukraine.
In a series of dynamic BVR scenarios, the Gripen E’s sensors received target data, and the Centaur AI autonomously executed complex maneuvers on behalf of the test pilot. The culmination of these scenarios saw the AI agent providing the pilot with firing cues for simulated air-to-air weapon launches.
Meanwhile, Marcus Wandt, Saab’s Chief Innovation Officer and a test pilot himself, remarked that the test flights “so far point to the fact that ‘it is not a given’ that a pilot will be able to win in aerial combat against an AI-supported opponent.”
“This is an important achievement for Saab, demonstrating our qualitative edge in sophisticated technologies by making AI deliver in the air,” said Peter Nilsson, head of Advanced Programs within Saab’s Aeronautics business area.
Insights gained from this program will feed into Sweden’s future fighter program, which aims to select one or more next-generation air combat platforms by 2031.
NATO is rolling out a new satellite surveillance system designed to monitor military activity in Ukraine and along the alliance's eastern borders, senior commander Admiral Pierre Vandier told Bloomberg in comments published on June 12.
The initiative, named Smart Indication and Warning Broad Area Detection (SINBAD), will allow NATO to scan vast territories with unprecedented frequency, using AI-powered analysis to detect changes and alert allies to potential threats. The alliance has reportedly selected U.S. satellite imaging firm Planet Labs as the project's key partner.
"Today, we're not certain the Russians will stop at Ukraine," Vandier said. "We'll be able to tell them: we're watching," he added.
Vandier, who oversees the alliance's battlefield innovations, emphasized that the ability to monitor troop movements and detect ceasefire violations has become a central concern for European allies, particularly as discussions continue around future peace frameworks for Ukraine.
Previously, French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer initiated a so-called "coalition of the willing," uniting countries that would back a potential peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia.
So far, at least 37 countries have been involved in the coalition's discussions, with 15 reportedly ready to contribute their troops. Other members have been asked to provide other forms of support, including intelligence, arms, or naval support.
The launch of SINBAD comes as NATO seeks to boost its own capabilities in space surveillance, a field where the alliance has long relied heavily on U.S. assets. While the U.S. remains central to NATO's space strategy, European allies are moving to reduce dependency, especially amid shifting U.S. foreign policy under President Donald Trump.
Trump has repeatedly cast doubt on the U.S. commitment to NATO, signaled intentions to reduce U.S. troop presence in Europe, and blamed Ukraine's pursuit of alliance membership for provoking the war.
The alliance is also expected to endorse a new defense spending benchmark, 5% of economic output, with 3.5% for core defense and 1.5% for related sectors, at its upcoming summit in The Hague on June 24–25.
President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed that Ukraine has been invited to attend the NATO leaders' summit. "We were invited to the NATO summit. I think this is important," Zelensky said during a June 2 press conference.
Zelensky noted ongoing discussions with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and other alliance officials on Ukraine's potential role and outcomes at the summit.
The Kyiv IndependentMartin Fornusek
They call you — and suddenly, you’re an “agent,” without even realizing it. Ukrainian law enforcement is reporting a surge in cases where the Russians target pensioners by phone, impersonating officers from the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) or the National Police. Victims are then blackmailed into carrying out sabotage missions for Russia, according to the National Police.
Similar tactics are being used across Europe. In the Baltic states, Russian operatives often recruit locals through Telegram, luring them with money or kompromat. These individuals are seen as expendable. Moscow discards them as soon as they’re no longer useful, a European intelligence official told The Guardian.
Russia’s strategy is clear: recruit people who are unaware they have become pawns in a campaign of international sabotage.
In Ukraine, elderly people are typically contacted via Viber. The goal: coerce them into following “orders” based on fake draft notices, fabricated criminal cases, or alleged links to Russia through purchases of medicines or dietary supplements.
One common scheme involves telling a pensioner that a drug they bought is banned because it was “produced in Russia.” That, the scammers claim, amounts to “collaboration with the enemy.” What follows is extortion — and a so-called “way out”: either wire money or complete a “small task.”
Pensioners in Kyiv have already contacted police after being defrauded or drawn into dangerous schemes. Ukraine’s Ministry of Internal Affairs emphasizes that legitimate security agencies never issue illegal or covert orders to citizens.
According to the SBU, Russian operatives are also attempting to recruit minors. These efforts often begin with photographing sensitive sites or tagging graffiti, and escalate to acts of sabotage against railway and energy infrastructure.
Moreover, in Europe, the Russians recruit Ukrainian agents to cause a double wave: shock in the West and propaganda within Russia.
A Polish citizen has been arrested on suspicion of spying for Russia, the Polish Prosecutor's Office announced on June 11.
According to prosecutors, 28-year-old Wiktor Z. was detained on June 4 by Poland's Internal Security Agency (ABW) on charges of gathering and passing sensitive information to Russia's intelligence services. The arrest followed searches of several properties in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian region in northern Poland, authorities said.
Warsaw has intensified its crackdown on Russian intelligence activity following a number of sabotage attacks allegedly directed by Moscow. Several suspected spy networks, allegedly run by Minsk and Moscow, have been uncovered in Poland over the past years.
Prosecutors said Wiktor Z. is suspected of offering to cooperate with Russian intelligence and engaging in espionage between February 2024 and April 2025 in the city of Bydgoszcz and abroad. He allegedly collected data about infrastructure critical to Poland's defense, the disclosure of which could pose a serious threat to national security.
The suspect acted "out of ideological and pro-Russian convictions," the Prosecutor's Office said in a statement. Wiktor Z. has been placed in pretrial detention for three months. If convicted, he faces a minimum of eight years in prison or up to a life sentence.
In May, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski announced the closure of the Russian consulate in Krakow after accusing Russian intelligence of orchestrating a 2024 arson attack that destroyed the Marywilska shopping center in Warsaw.
Polish officials, including Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Justice Minister Adam Bodnar, have blamed the Kremlin for directing the sabotage, citing detailed intelligence. Multiple individuals have been arrested in connection with the fire, which burned down a complex housing over 1,400 stores.
Authorities in Lithuania have also linked Russia's intelligence services to similar sabotage incidents, including an arson attack on an IKEA warehouse in Vilnius, causing over half a million euros in damages. Polish and Lithuanian officials are reportedly cooperating on the investigations.
Russia has denied involvement and condemned Poland's move to shut down its diplomatic post, warning of retaliation.
Western officials have warned of a growing Russian sabotage campaign across Europe targeting states that support Ukraine amid Moscow's ongoing invasion.
The Kyiv IndependentKateryna Denisova
Russia helped significantly improve North Korea's KN-23 ballistic missiles, also known as Hwasong-11, after receiving the first inaccurate batch from Pyongyang, Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine's military intelligence (HUR) chief, said in an interview with The War Zone published on June 9.
North Korea has supplied Russia with ammunition, ballistic missiles, and soldiers since the beginning of the full-scale invasion.
KN-23 ballistic missiles initially flew with a deviation of a few kilometers and around half fired at Ukraine by Russia malfunctioned and exploded in mid-air, Reuters reported in May 2024, citing Ukraine's Prosecutor General's Office.
But now they are hitting their targets, Budanov said, without specifying what exactly was changed in the North Korean missiles.
"The KN-23 missiles that were delivered in the very beginning, now it's an absolutely different missile in (terms) of their technical characteristics. The accuracy has increased many times," Budanov said.
"This is the result of the common work of Russian and North Korean specialists. Also, there is the modernization of long-range air-to-air missiles, particular technologies on submarines, and unfortunately, ballistic missiles, which can carry nuclear payloads," he added.
According to Budanov, Russia has also agreed to help North Korea begin domestic production of Shahed-type kamikaze drones.
Pyongyang has ratcheted up its support for Russia following Russian President Vladimir Putin's signing of a mutual defense pact with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in June 2024.
According to a May 29 report by the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team (MSMT), Pyongyang shipped to Russia up to 9 million artillery shells and at least 100 ballistic missiles in 2024 alone.
North Korea's involvement in the war expanded in fall 2024, when it deployed thousands of troops to Russia's western border to help fend off a large-scale Ukrainian incursion.
The move followed the signing of a defense treaty between the two countries in June 2024, obligating both to provide military aid if either is attacked.
North Korea acknowledged its role in the war only in April 2025. A month later, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un said the country's participation was part of a "sacred mission," aligning Pyongyang's narrative with Moscow's.
The Kyiv IndependentKollen Post
Russia is providing North Korea with technology to produce Shahed kamikaze drones and has dramatically improved the accuracy of Pyongyang’s ballistic missiles, potentially shifting the military balance on the Korean peninsula, Ukraine’s spymaster reported.
Lt-Gen Kyrylo Budanov, commander of Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Directorate (HUR), revealed in an interview with The War Zone that Russia and North Korea have reached agreements to establish drone production capabilities on North Korean territory.
“[There are] agreements on the beginning of the creation of capabilities to produce UAVs of the Garpiya and Geran (the Russian designation for Iranian Shahed 131 and Shahed 136 drones, – Ed.) types on the territory of North Korea,” Budanov stated. “It will for sure bring changes in the military balance in the region between North Korea and South Korea.”
The Shahed family of drones has been the most prolific long-range aerial threat to Ukraine throughout the war. Russia currently produces approximately 2,000 units monthly with plans to increase production to 5,000 per month, according to The War Zone.
The technology transfer extends beyond drone production. Budanov revealed that North Korean KN-23 short-range ballistic missiles, also known as Hwasong-11, have been transformed from unreliable weapons into precision strike systems through Russian assistance.
“Initially, with the beginning of the transfer to Russia, they were flying with a deviation of a few kilometers, but now they are exactly hitting the target,” Budanov explained. “This is the result of the common work of Russian and North Korean specialists.”
Russia is assisting North Korea’s nuclear weapons program by solving critical problems with missile carriers and submarine-based launch systems. According to Budanov, North Korea previously struggled with these delivery systems, but Russian specialists are now providing solutions.
The intelligence chief pointed to the dramatic transformation of KN-23 missiles as proof – weapons that initially arrived are now completely different in their technical characteristics, with accuracy improved multiple times. The cooperation extends to upgrading aviation systems, including long-range air-to-air missiles, and submarine technologies for nuclear-armed ballistic missiles.
Budanov confirmed that approximately 11,000 North Korean troops are currently deployed in Russia’s Kursk Oblast. North Korea has supplied extensive armaments to support Russia’s war effort, including 122mm D-74 howitzers, 107mm infantry multiple launch rocket systems, 240mm MLRS, and 170mm M1989 Koksan self-propelled artillery guns.
Regarding the Koksan artillery, Budanov noted Russia received 120 units and expects more deliveries, describing them as unfortunately effective long-range weapons performing well in combat.
Following Shoigu’s visit, Russia will import North Korean workers to replace Central Asian migrants deemed security risks. These workers could potentially become “Russian warriors, but of North Korean nationality” through military contracts.
HUR is now determining the program’s scope.
3. 15 WordPress-style tags: North Korea, Shahed drones, Russia-Ukraine war, Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine intelligence, KN-23 missiles, Military technology transfer, Kursk Oblast, Nuclear weapons technology, Submarine technology, Koksan artillery, North Korean troops, Geran drones, Defense Intelligence Directorate, Ballistic missiles
Ukraine’s military intelligence has disclosed technical specifications of Russia’s V2U strike drone, which employs artificial intelligence for autonomous target selection and operates primarily in the Sumy Oblast, according to a report from the Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine’s Defense Ministry.
The drone’s computational system runs on a Chinese Leetop A203 minicomputer powered by an NVIDIA Jetson Orin high-speed processor assembly, intelligence officials revealed. This configuration enables the aircraft to identify and engage targets without human intervention.
“V2U is equipped with only one GPS module, which likely indicates Russians’ abandonment of satellite navigation due to Ukrainian electronic warfare systems,” the intelligence reported. “Navigation is likely implemented through ‘computer vision’ — the drone compares camera images with pre-loaded terrain photos.”
The aircraft incorporates FPV control capabilities through LTE communication, utilizing a Microdrive Tandem-4GS-OEM-11 modem-router that operates with Ukrainian mobile carrier SIM cards, according to the intelligence assessment.
Ukrainian analysts determined that despite Russian markings, the modem’s components originate from China. The drone’s construction relies predominantly on Chinese-manufactured parts, including the engine, GPS module, servos, solid-state drive, rangefinder, speed controllers, and power elements.
“A Japanese light-sensitive Sony sensor, an electromagnetic relay from Irish company Te Connectivity, and the mentioned American Jetson Orin module are installed,” intelligence officials added.
The disclosure follows Russia’s 29 May deployment of another new weapon system — the Dan-M jet-powered strike drone capable of reaching altitudes up to 9 kilometers. Military communications expert Serhiy Beskrestnov said that Dan-M represents a converted aerial target originally designed for air defense training and testing.
A secret Russian intelligence document obtained by The New York Times shows the FSB’s growing alarm over Chinese espionage, despite Moscow’s repeated public claims of an unbreakable friendship with Beijing.
Although President Vladimir Putin has hailed a “limitless” partnership with Xi Jinping, Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) refers to China as “the enemy” in an internal memo that outlines counterespionage priorities. The undated eight-page planning document was likely written in late 2023 or early 2024 and was authenticated by six Western intelligence agencies contacted by The New York Times.
The FSB accuses Chinese intelligence of attempting to recruit Russian scientists, officials, and businesspeople, collecting military secrets related to Russia’s war in Ukraine, and using corporate and academic fronts to gather information in sensitive regions, including the Arctic and Central Asia.
The intelligence standoff unfolds as Putin and Xi continue to tighten their alliance, having met over 40 times since Russia’s full-scale invasion began. Though bound by economic needs, the two powers operate with deep mutual distrust, NYT says. Russia relies heavily on China for oil exports, electronics, and alternatives to Western companies. According to an FSB document, tensions persist within this strategic relationship.
The document was obtained by cybercrime group Ares Leaks, according to NYT. Although the group did not disclose how it accessed the file, six Western agencies deemed it credible. It is the most detailed known insight into the Russian counterintelligence view of China.
China provides 80% of critical electronics for Russian drones, intelligence agency says
The FSB claims Chinese agents are particularly focused on Russia’s military tactics in Ukraine, especially drone warfare, modernization methods, and countermeasures against Western weapons. Chinese defense-linked institutions reportedly flooded into Russia soon after the 2022 invasion, seeking firsthand data from the conflict.
The memo also mentions Beijing’s interest in Russia’s discontinued ekranoplan project and the recruitment of aviation scientists. Dissatisfied or financially pressured employees of aircraft research institutes were considered likely targets.
The FSB directive includes the monitoring of Chinese messaging app WeChat and mandates hacking into phones of espionage suspects. Officers are instructed to accumulate data using internal software tools to identify threats and intercept leaks of strategic information.
The FSB warns of Chinese academic efforts to find “ancient Chinese peoples” in Russia’s Far East and spread revanchist narratives. A 2023 Chinese map labeled areas of Russia with historical Chinese names. Officers are ordered to investigate such activities and restrict access for involved foreigners.
Russia, China declare joint front against US as Xi wants “end to external interference” in Moscow
The document also highlights Beijing’s growing interest in Russia’s Arctic development and the Northern Sea Route. FSB analysts believe Chinese spies use mining companies and academic research to access strategic data.
Despite these concerns, the FSB is cautious not to trigger diplomatic fallout. The document advises against public statements labeling China a threat and requires high-level approval before any sensitive actions.
Two Russian agents were arrested by Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) on June 7 after allegedly planting a car bomb targeting a Dnipro prosecutor on June 6.
"As the investigation established, the enemy agents turned out to be two men whom the Russian Federation recruited through Telegram channels," the SBU said.
Russian intelligence regularly attempts to recruit Ukrainian civilians over social media to carry out terrorist attacks or gather information in exchange for money.
The two men allegedly planted an improvised explosive device (IED) under the car of a Dnipro prosecutor's office employee.
"As a result of this crime, the law enforcement officer received minor injuries, and his vehicle was completely destroyed. According to doctors, the prosecutor's life is currently not in danger," the SBU said.
The detainees were instructed by Russian intelligence services to monitor the prosecutor, his daily schedule, and transport routes prior to the attack.
The two agents were then instructed to plant a car bomb and take photos and videos of the aftermath of the explosion.
"Currently, both detainees are giving law enforcement officers incriminating evidence against their curator and subversive work in the interests of the Russian Federation," the SBU said.
The two suspects are being charged with committing a terrorist attack and could face up to 12 years in prison.
On June 5, the SBU said Russian intelligence operatives are impersonating the SBU in an expanded effort to recruit Ukrainian civilians for sabotage operations.
The Kyiv IndependentAbbey Fenbert
© Tolga Akmen/EPA, via Shutterstock
Moscow ramps up production of millions of drones — not without help from China, which officially “knows nothing” about the cooperation, writes Politico.
Moscow has gained an advantage in the drone war in Ukraine due to its vast financial resources, production lines located far from the front lines, and especially assistance from Beijing.
Oleh Aleksandrov, a representative of Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service, says Chinese manufacturers supply Russia with equipment, electronics, navigation, optical, and telemetry systems, engines, microchips, processor modules, antenna systems, and control boards.
“They use so-called shell companies, change names, do everything to avoid being subject to export control and avoid sanctions for their activities,” he explains.
Officially, China claims to comply with all regulations. But only officially, Aleksandrov adds.
According to him, Russia increased its production of long-range drones from 15,000 in 2024 to over 30,000 this year and aims to produce up to 2 million small tactical drones.
“They aim to produce about 30,000 long-range drones of those types plus 30,000 false target drones they use to exhaust Ukrainian air defenses in 2025,” he continues.
As for FPV drones, the Russians intend to manufacture as many as 2 million of them in 2025.
Russia is also increasing its use of fiber-optic drones, which are immune to electronic warfare. Ukrainian forces previously could detect ordinary Russian drones as soon as they took off, but this is much harder with fiber-optic ones.
“So we have to use different acoustic and other means to trace those drones,” said Andrii, the army commander.
Moreover, according to him, the Russians are ramping up not only drone production but also electronic warfare systems.
Radio frequencies change on his section of the front every two weeks. As a result, when Ukraine supplies drones, only about 20% of them are usable. Constant adjustments cost extra time and money.
Russian intelligence operatives are impersonating Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) in an expanded effort to recruit Ukrainian civilians for sabotage operations, the SBU said June 5.
The new tactic, described by the agency as a “false flag” operation, involves contacting Ukrainian citizens while posing as SBU officials conducting official inquiries. The SBU said this marks a notable escalation and shift in Russia’s recruitment strategy.
"This is a so-called special operations technique known as 'false flag,' which has not been used by Russian invaders until now, but which they are actively trying to apply now," the agency said in a statement.
According to the SBU, targeted individuals typically receive messages via instant messaging apps, instructing them to report to an “SBU investigator” regarding fabricated criminal charges.
That “assistance,” however, comes with strings attached. Victims are pressured into carrying out tasks ranging from surveillance and courier duties to transferring funds. In more serious cases, they are asked to purchase chemicals for explosive devices, set fire to Ukrainian military vehicles or conduct sabotage against government buildings.
"In some cases, Russian curators also demand that malicious software be installed on the victim's phone, allowing them to monitor activity and location in real time," the SBU statement said.
While earlier recruitment efforts focused largely on teenagers, the SBU warned that elderly Ukrainians are now increasingly being targeted. The agency said it has disrupted several of these operations in recent weeks but did not provide specific examples.
Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, Ukrainian officials say the Kremlin has stepped up intelligence-gathering and subversive activity inside Ukraine, with particular focus on coercing civilians into supporting reconnaissance and sabotage efforts.
The Kyiv IndependentOlena Goncharova
Russia’s production of Shahed drones and their imitators reached approximately 170 units per day as of May 2025, Ukrainska Pravda reported on 4 June, citing Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR).
The country plans to increase this output to 190 drones daily by the end of the year, according to the GUR.
The intelligence agency said that drone technology has evolved significantly since 2022. “The configurations of the Shahed in 2022 and 2025 differ substantially,” GUR reported, highlighting several key modifications introduced over the past year alone.
Russia has substantially modified the drones’ warheads beyond standard high-explosive and fragmentation variants. Shaheds now carry combined cumulative-fragmentation-high-explosive warheads, as well as cumulative-fragmentation-high-explosive-incendiary versions, according to GUR. The intelligence directorate explains that different warhead types are selected for specific targets to maximize damage.
The explosive payload has increased from 50 to 90 kilograms, according to GUR. Some drones now feature Starlink terminals, enabling real-time control of the aircraft.
Foreign journalists recently reported possible connections between Shaheds and Ukrainian mobile networks. The Economist claimed that Russian drones operate through Telegram bots using Ukrainian SIM cards. However, Ukrainian military radio technology specialist Serhiy Flash later refuted this information.
Russia has upgraded its electronic warfare resistance technology on Shaheds, according to GUR. The country began protecting signal receivers with specialized CRPA antennas capable of ignoring false satellite signals.
Russia received its first hundreds of Shaheds from Iran in 2022. By summer 2023, the country began independent production of these drones at a facility located 1,200 kilometers from the front line in the Alabuga special economic zone in Yelabuga city. The plant produces a localized version of the Iranian drone under the designation Geran-2.
Drones play a crucial role in the Russo-Ukraine war by providing real-time intelligence, conducting precision strikes, disrupting logistics, and supporting frontline troops, with Ukraine leveraging mass-produced, low-cost drones to inflict significant damage on Russian forces and infrastructure. Both sides employ a wide variety of drones for reconnaissance, attack, electronic warfare, and supply missions, fundamentally reshaping the battlefield and warfare tactics.
The Crimean Bridge, which was illegally constructed after the 2014 annexation of Crimea, linking the occupied peninsula with Russia, has come under attack twice in a single day, UNIAN reports.
On 3 June, Ukraine’s Security Service took responsibility for the third operation targeting the bridge since 2022. Ukrainian agents planted 1,100 kilograms of explosives in the bridge’s support pillars. In the early morning, a controlled detonation was triggered, damaging an underwater support structure. The blast reportedly caused serious damage, placing the bridge in a “critical condition.”
Since 1 June 2025, Ukraine has intensified its bold attacks on Russian infrastructure, including strikes on four airfields and 41 aircraft used to kill Ukrainian civilians. These operations aim to pressure Moscow into agreeing to a ceasefire and peace deal. Talks held on 2 June between Ukraine and Russia again ended without a peace agreement.
“The attack on the Crimean Bridge continues. They’re breaching defensive barriers. The bridge is closed,” writes the Russian Telegram channel ChP / Crimea.
Russian military blogger Vladimir Romanov claimed the strike was carried out using unmanned surface vessels, or sea drones. He said Russian forces managed to destroy one drone, but the attack was still ongoing.
Z-channel 13 TACTICAL, associated with Russian military sources, also reported “explosions near the bridge’s defensive perimeter.”
Meanwhile, the pro-Ukrainian Telegram channel Crimean Wind reported a powerful explosion in Kerch in the afternoon.
“A helicopter has been launched to patrol the shoreline along the strait. Kerch-based Telegram groups are in panic,” the channel noted.
Additionally, Russian air defenses were reportedly active at the Belbek airbase near occupied Sevastopol, while residents in Russian-occupied Feodosia heard two explosions.
Eyewitness videos circulating online show the Crimean Bridge enveloped in smoke, possibly from a deliberate smoke screen to obstruct incoming missiles and drones, or as a result of explosions in the vicinity.
Even in captivity, the enemy looks for cracks. Every Ukrainian released from Russian detention undergoes a screening by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) as Moscow may try to recruit them, according to Andrii Yusov, Deputy Head of the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, Ukrinform reports.
According to him, no saboteurs have been found among the former prisoners.
“Infiltrating a saboteur this way would be extremely difficult or senseless for the Russian intelligence services,” he says.
At the same time, Russian agencies did try to work with every prisoner: “In one way or another, they tried to manipulate them, sometimes even pressure their families. That’s why the state checks everything,” Yusov adds.
Counterintelligence analyzes the conditions of captivity, the prisoner’s behavior, and any possible contacts with the FSB. If evidence of collaboration is found, “procedural actions are taken in accordance with Ukrainian law.”
“Undoubtedly, none of this is overlooked,” Yusov emphasizes.
Earlier, Kyiv and Moscow agreed on the largest exchange of fallen soldiers since the full-scale war began in the latest meeting in Istanbul. This includes exchanging 6,000 bodies of fallen soldiers for the same number from the Russian side.
Russian intelligence services are actively attempting to recruit Ukrainian nationals for illegal operations across the European Union, Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) said on June 2.
In a statement, the agency warned that Kremlin-linked operatives are offering money to vulnerable Ukrainians, particularly those from Russian-occupied territories, to conduct surveillance of critical infrastructure and carry out other tasks for the benefit of the Russian state.
"The recruitment of Ukrainians for hostile operations in Europe is yet another tool of hybrid aggression that the Russian Federation is waging against Ukraine and the entire European community," the agency said.
The intelligence agency urged Ukrainian citizens abroad to immediately report any contact with suspicious individuals to local law enforcement or Ukrainian diplomatic missions.
The warning comes amid a growing number of suspected Russian-directed sabotage and arson plots across Europe involving Ukrainian nationals.
British security officials are currently investigating possible Russian involvement in a series of arson attacks targeting properties linked to U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the Financial Times reported on May 23. The incidents include fires at Starmer's family home, a vehicle, and a former residence in London earlier this month.
Three men — Ukrainian nationals Roman Lavrynovych and Petro Pochynok, and Romanian Stanislav Carpiuc — have been charged with conspiracy to commit arson with intent to endanger life. Prosecutors allege they acted in coordination with unknown individuals, and U.K. authorities are examining whether Russian agents may have recruited them.
German authorities have also accused three Ukrainian nationals of being involved in a Russian-orchestrated parcel bomb plot, according to Der Spiegel. The suspects were arrested in May during coordinated raids in Germany and Switzerland.
In a separate case on May 12, Poland charged two Ukrainians in connection with suspected Russian-backed arson attacks at an IKEA store in Vilnius and a shopping mall in Warsaw in 2024.
Additionally, Russian intelligence is believed to be behind a July 2024 fire at a DHL airport logistics hub in Leipzig, Germany. Investigators said a flammable package sent from Lithuania was marked for delivery to a fake address in Birmingham, U.K.
Western officials have repeatedly accused Moscow of using covert sabotage, cyberattacks, and disinformation as part of its broader campaign to destabilize European nations that support Ukraine during the Russian large-scale war.
The Ukrainian intelligence agency emphasized that such operations rely on exploiting desperate individuals and weaponizing them against host countries. It called on European governments to remain vigilant and closely coordinate with Ukrainian security services.
The Kyiv IndependentOleg Sukhov
Russian air force suffers devastating blow it will not recover from. The loss of strategic missile-carrying bombers destroyed or damaged today is a blow Russia will not be able to compensate for, according to military analyst Oleksandr Kovalenko.
Today, Russia lost over 40 aircraft, either destroyed or damaged, including valuable strategic bombers of various types. The Ukrainian strikes hit four military airfields, including the Olenya airbase near Murmansk and the Belaya airbase in Irkutsk Oblast.
The unique feature of this operation was that the drones didn’t fly from Ukraine, instead, they were transported by truck closer to the targets and launched from minimal distance. They were controlled by artificial intelligence, which selected targets autonomously.
Kovalenko stresses that aircraft like the Tu-95MS, Tu-22M3, and Tu-160 are no longer manufactured in modern Russia. What Russian propaganda calls “new” aircraft are merely refurbished Soviet-era units.
“To this day, Russia has not produced a single brand-new Tu-22M3 or Tu-160 from scratch — only reassembled legacy models from the Soviet era. In fact, everything that was damaged or destroyed today is beyond restoration and certainly can’t be replaced by new production,” Kovalenko says.
The loss of the Tu-160 is especially painful for Russia. It is the most expensive and unique aircraft in the Russian Aerospace Forces, a true “unicorn,” as Kovalenko puts it.
“Sadly, it’s not the last unicorn. If there’s a true last unicorn, it would be the A-50 early warning aircraft. I think even more spectacular news about that might be coming soon!” he adds.
Earlier, Ukrainian journalist Yurii Butusov said the Security Service smuggled 150 small strike drones and 300 munitions into Russia, 116 of which took off during the latest operation against Russian aircraft.
At least 150 AI-guided Ukrainian drones strike 41 Russian aircraft in historic truck-smuggled strike
Control was conducted via Russian telecom networks using auto-targeting.
Russia bombs Ukrainian schools and children’s hospitals. Kyiv hits back with strikes on Moscow’s aircraft.
According to the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), the estimated value of the aircraft destroyed or damaged during the special operation “Web” is approximately $7 billion.
The agency notes that a total of 34% of Russia’s strategic missile carriers based at their main airfields were hit in the operation. The SBU promises to release more details about the mission later.
“You thought Ukraine was that simple? Ukraine is super. Ukraine is unique. It has endured the steamrollers of history. In today’s world, it is priceless,” the SBU press service stated, quoting prominent Ukrainian writer Lina Kostenko.
Meanwhile, CBS News reports that the White House has not been informed in advance of Ukraine’s plans to carry out a large-scale strike on Russian strategic aviation. It summarizes the day’s events and adds that White House spokespeople declined to comment on the Ukrainian strike. This information has also been confirmed by Axios, citing an unnamed Ukrainian official.
Never before have drones with artificial intelligence executed such precise strikes on Russian military airbases as in the operation Web by Ukrainian forces, writes Clash Report.
On 1 June, Ukrainian drones featuring artificial intelligence attacked several Russian military airfields across different regions. Over 40 aircraft were destroyed or damaged, including strategic bombers used by Russia to kill civilians. Unlike previous attacks, the drones did not fly thousands of kilometers from Ukraine. Instead, they were transported in the Russian territory by trucks, then launched into the air for sudden strikes.
“Last year, Ukrainian military intelligence scanned Russian bomber aircraft and trained AI to recognize them and execute automatic dive attack algorithms. Today, we’ve seen the results,” reports Clash Report.
Two types of drones were used — vertical takeoff quadcopters and “wing-type” drones launched from mini catapults.
At the same time, Ukrainian journalist Yurii Butusov emphasizes the uniqueness of the Security Service operation, calling it a historic military textbook case, noting that 41 aircraft were hit across four airbases.
“Some drones attacked using auto-targeting. Results will be confirmed by satellite imagery,” Butusov adds.
According to him, the Security Service smuggled 150 small strike drones and 300 munitions into Russia, 116 of which took off. Control was conducted via Russian telecom networks using auto-targeting.
“The drones attacked from close range during daylight deep in enemy rear areas… the Russians did not expect small quadcopters to strike in daylight,” the journalist says.
The most successful attack was on Olenya airfield, where drones hit fuel tanks, causing a large number of aircraft to burn completely. All Ukrainian agents have returned safely home without losses.
Two explosions in the early hours of 30 May near Desantnaya Bay in Russia’s Vladivostok were part of a planned operation by Ukraine’s military intelligence agency (HUR), according to Ukrainian outlets RBC-Ukraine and UNIAN.
Sources say the blasts targeted the 47th Separate Air Assault Battalion of Russia’s 155th Guards Naval Infantry Brigade (Unit No. 30926). One explosion reportedly struck a checkpoint, the other hit an area housing personnel and commanders.
This brigade has been actively involved in combat against Ukraine, including documented deployments in Mariupol, Vuhledar, and Kursk Oblast.
According to the same sources, the attack caused injuries and material damage.
“Personnel, military equipment, and special assets were hit,” the reports quoted unnamed intelligence sources as saying.
Citing local residents, RBC reported that at least ten ambulances and an evacuation helicopter arrived at the scene. Damaged military hardware was reportedly removed from the site using Russian military URAL trucks.
Russian media report explosions in Russian Vladivostok in the area of a marine training ground.
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) May 30, 2025
It is reported that the road in the area of the incident was blocked, eyewitnesses reported a helicopter flying over the site. Special and emergency services arrived at the scene, and… pic.twitter.com/QUYtRbXumo
Russian authorities confirmed two explosions but denied any casualties or damage. The Anti-Terrorism Commission of Primorsky Krai attributed the incident to the ignition of gas cylinders.
Emergency services cordoned off the area, and traffic between Shamora Bay and the village of Shchitovaya was partially restricted.
“The threat has been neutralized,” officials stated.
Local media and Telegram channels, including VChK-OGPU and Vladivostok1.ru, reported heavy police and military presence in the area. Roads were blocked, vehicles inspected, and helicopters were seen flying before the blasts.
Witnesses described the removal of large, tarp-covered objects—possibly military vehicles—under guard. The Telegram channel The True Story reported that the location is used for loading and unloading military equipment for naval deployment.
According to Radio Svoboda, Desantnaya Bay may also house a training ground for the Pacific Fleet’s naval infantry, which has taken part in combat operations against Ukraine.
Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) was behind explosions near Desantnaya Bay in Russia's Vladivostok on May 30, which reportedly damaged military personnel and equipment, a source in HUR told the Kyiv Independent.
If confirmed, the Vladivostok operation would be Ukraine's furthest incursion into Russian territory - approximately 6,800 kilometres from the Ukrainian border.
According to the source, two blasts occurred early in the morning at a site where Russia's 47th Separate Air Assault Battalion of the 155th Separate Guards Marine Brigade was stationed.
The 155th Marine Brigade has been actively involved in the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, including battles in Mariupol and Vuhledar in Donetsk Oblast, as well as operations in Russia's Kursk Oblast.
Local media reported two loud bangs, followed by temporary road closures and emergency vehicles seen in the area, but did not mention anything about a military base.
Russia's Anti-Terrorist Commission of Primorsky Krai attributed the explosions to the ignition of propane-butane cylinders inside a vehicle. No official casualties have been reported.
One of the explosions allegedly happened near a checkpoint, while the other hit the location of personnel and the unit's command.
"Manpower, military equipment, and special equipment were hit," the source claimed.
The Kyiv Independent could not verify these claims.
Desantnaya Bay is located in Vladivostok in Russia's Far East, which lies some 185 kilometres (114 miles) from the Russian-North Korean border.
The Kyiv IndependentAsami Terajima
Residents in Russian regions along the Ukrainian border complain the area is increasingly uninhabitable due to the government's actions amid Moscow's attempt to establish a "buffer zone," according to a call intercepted by Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) and posted May 29.
Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed on May 22 that he ordered the military to begin creating a "security buffer zone" along the border of Kursk, Bryansk, and Belgorod oblasts.
In the call, a resident of Russia's Belgorod Oblast claims that authorities have cut off gas along the border. The speaker predicts mandatory evacuations will follow as living conditions worsen.
"Well, in short, it's clear that they're going to kick everyone out of the border areas and create a gray zone," the unidentified individual says.
"Gray zones" refer to areas along the border and front lines where there is contested or unclear control.
The resident speaking on the call anticipates that the area will become so heavily militarized it will be partitioned from the rest of the region.
"Let them make temporary settlements, zones, and that's it. They'll even fence it off with barbed wire," the resident says.
Russia's Belogorod Oblast, which borders Ukraine's Sumy, Kharkiv, and Luhansk oblasts, is regularly used as a staging area for Russian attacks on Ukrainian territory. Russian officials have also accused Kyiv of repeatedly launching strikes on the region and the city of Belgorod since the war began.
Ukraine launched a small-scale offensive in Belgorod Oblast in late March, marking Kyiv's second cross-border operation in Russian territory after the August 2024 Kursk incursion.
Russian forces are now reportedly amassing along the border in preparation for a possible offensive against Ukraine's Sumy Oblast, according to the State Border Guard Service.
Moscow has repeatedly indicated plans to create a buffer zone between Ukraine and Russia in the area.
Escalated violence along the Sumy border has triggered mass civilian evacuations, with tens of thousands of Ukrainians ordered to leave their homes.
The Kyiv IndependentThe Kyiv Independent news desk
Sergey Surovikin, former Commander of the Russian Group of Forces in Ukraine, has appeared publicly for the first time since 2023, reportedly taking up a new role as “head of a group of Russian military specialists” at the Russian Embassy in Algeria. According to the British Ministry of Defence’s Defence Intelligence update on 27 May, photographs released by the Russian Embassy depict a visibly thinner Surovikin participating in an event commemorating Russia’s 9 May Victory Day.
The Ministry reported that Surovikin had not been seen in public for many months following the failed June 2023 mutiny by the Wagner Group, which was led by Yevgeny Prigozhin. The uprising was publicly denounced by Russian President Vladimir Putin as “treason.” Surovikin, who also served as commander-in-chief of the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS), did not appear in official functions during the period following the mutiny.
The report notes that there were no public confirmations regarding Surovikin’s arrest or detention in relation to the mutiny. The Russian Defense Ministry (MoD) did not officially declare his resignation. However, by September 2023, references to him were reportedly removed from the Ministry of Defense’s website, suggesting a change in his status.
“Russian authorities were likely suspicious of Surovikin’s long association with Wagner dating back to his operational activity in Syria, a notable operational nexus for Wagner, from 2017. Surovikin also served as point of contact for Wagner with the Russian MOD,” the intelligence update reads.
Ukraine will increase interceptor drone and ballistic missile funding amid increased Russian drone and missile attacks, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an evening address on May 26.
"I instructed a significant increase in the production of our interceptor drones, and we will be engaging more funding from our partners to support this," Zelensky said.
"I also ordered dedicated funding for Ukraine’s ballistic missile program to accelerate missile production," he added.
Russia has intensified aerial attacks against Ukraine in recent days. On May 26, Russia launched its third large-scale aerial and drone assault against Ukraine in three nights, killing at least six people and injuring 24 across the country.
The attack marked the most extensive drone strike against Ukraine during the full-scale war, topping the previous record of 298 drones just a day earlier on May 25.
Russia launched over 900 strike drones over the last three days, in addition to cruise and ballistic missiles, Zelensky said.
"Over 900 attack drones launched against Ukraine in just three days, along with ballistic and cruise missiles. There is no military logic in this, but it is a clear political choice — the choice of Putin, the choice of Russia — the choice to keep waging war and destroying lives."
Ukraine and Russia held peace talks in Istanbul on May 16, where both sides agreed to a 1,000-for-1,000 prisoner exchange.
The peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia were largely inconclusive, with Moscow reiterating maximalist demands and sending a delegation of lower-level officials.
Despite the peace talks in Turkey, Russia has intensified drone and missile attacks against Ukraine.
Russia launched nine Kh-101 cruise missiles from Tu-95MS bomber planes and a record number of 355 Shahed-type attack drones and decoys overnight, Ukraine's Air Force reported on May 26.
The Kyiv IndependentThe Kyiv Independent news desk
Russia is "preparing new offensive operations" in its full-scale war against Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on May 26, following an intelligence briefing.
Kyiv has previously warned about the threat of a new major Russian offensive targeting Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv and Sumy oblasts this spring and summer. While Russia has made only minimal territorial gains at the cost of heavy losses over the last several months, Moscow has doubled down on its maximalist objectives in recent peace talks.
Ukrainian intelligence reports confirm that Russia is not seriously interested in a peace settlement, Zelensky said in his evening address on May 26.
"We can see from the information that our intelligence is gathering and from open data that (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and his entourage have no plans to end the war — there is no evidence that they are seriously considering peace and that they are seriously considering diplomacy," he said.
"On the contrary, there is a lot of evidence that they are preparing new offensive operations."
The intelligence agencies of Ukraine's allies have likely seen the same evidence, Zelensky said. He urged partner nations to apply "appropriate joint pressure" on Moscow in response.
The Kyiv IndependentKI Insights
Zelensky's latest remarks come after three nights of relentless Russian aerial attacks against Ukrainian cities — launched while the Kremlin drags its feet in delivering the terms of its proposed "memorandum" on a possible future peace settlement.
The memorandum was Putin's counteroffer after he again rejected a ceasefire in a two-hour phone call with U.S. President Donald Trump on May 19. Russia has still not delivered the document presenting its settlement terms.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Russia would only submit the draft "settlement document" after Ukraine and Russia concluded their 1,000-for-1,000 prisoner exchange. The swap was completed on May 25.
Zelensky called attention to Russia's delay in submitting the memorandum.
"They have spent more than a week on this," he said. "They talk a lot about diplomacy. But when in the midst of this, there are constant Russian strikes, constant killings, constant assaults, and preparations for new offensives, this is definitely a diagnosis. Russia deserves full-scale pressure — everything that can be done to limit their military capabilities."
According to Zelensky, Russia launched over 900 strike drones over the last three days, in addition to cruise and ballistic missiles. Ukraine is looking to increase its production of interceptor drones and direct additional funding to developing its ballistic missile program, he said.
Officials and experts told the Washington Post (WP) on May 24 that Russia likely lacks the military capability to mount an offensive that could successfully break Ukraine's lines. The decline in Russia's military advantage could make coordinated Western pressure on the Kremlin more effective, officials said.
Zelensky urged the U.S. and Europe to enact "new and strong sanctions" against Moscow to force Putin to accept a ceasefire and show "respect" for the diplomatic process.
While Trump criticized Putin after the latest round of large-scale attacks, the U.S. president has a history of failing to follow through on threats of sanctions against Russia.
The Kyiv IndependentAndrea Januta
Ukraine’s foreign intelligence chief Oleh Ivashchenko says that Belarus has nuclear weapon carriers but no actual nuclear weapons on its territory. The same applies to Oreshnik missile systems.
Ivashchenko said this in his first interview since Russia’s full-scale invasion to Ukrinform news agency.
Belarus hosts Russian weapons and military forces primarily due to deep security integration within the Union State framework, aimed at mutual defense and strengthening both countries’ positions against perceived NATO threats.
Russia first began deep military integration with Belarus in the 1990s, notably with the creation of joint military structures like the Regional Group of Forces (RGF) and the signing of treaties in 1996–1999.
In 2022, Russian troops used Belarusian territory as a launch point for their northern invasion of Ukraine, attacking toward Kyiv from the north and northeast.
The Ukrainian intelligence chief confirmed that delivery systems exist in Belarus. “Carriers are there. This is true. There are aircraft, there are Iskander tactical missile systems. But there are no actual nuclear weapons in Belarus. This is a fact,” Ivashchenko said.
Belarus is preparing storage facilities for nuclear weapons, the intelligence chief reports. Construction work continues at these sites.
Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko claims his country will receive Oreshnik systems by the end of the year. Ivashchenko questions this timeline.
“This looks like wishful thinking. Today there is nothing like that, and it is unlikely to appear,” the intelligence service head said.
Russia and Belarus signed agreements on tactical nuclear weapons deployment in May 2023. Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the following month that some Russian nuclear weapons were already in Belarus.
Lukashenko ordered the development of nuclear weapons use algorithms in late June 2023. These procedures would govern weapons stationed by Russia.
In January 2025, Lukashenko said Belarus would receive Oreshnik missile systems “any day now.” He claimed Belarus would initially get ten Oreshnik complexes from Russia. The number could increase if Russia decides to provide more systems.
Oreshnik is a Russian experimental ballistic missile, officially called Kedr by Ukrainian intelligence, which is a modernized version of Soviet-era missiles with a claimed long range and high speed. Russia first launched Oreshnik at Ukraine on 21 November 2024, targeting Dnipro.
Belarus has become economically dependent on Russia since the invasion began. “About 80% of Belarusian defense enterprises are integrated into the Russian defense complex. This is essentially one base,” according to Ivashchenko.
Intelligence chief also provided detailed assessments of Russia’s strategic plans and military capabilities.
Ivashchenko warned about Russian plans for the Suwalki Corridor. “Since 2015, literally every exercise by Russia and Belarus has been about establishing control over the Suwalki Corridor. This is not fantasy, but part of their strategic scenarios,” he said.
Russia is already preparing new military structures. “Russia is not going to stop this war. In their heads, they are restoring the Soviet Union with the hands of the army. They are creating new districts and divisions. To be precise, 13 divisions,” the intelligence chief said.
China is providing machine tools, special chemicals, gunpowder and components directly to Russian military enterprises, according to Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service.
China has consistently avoided condemning Russia’s war in Ukraine and stresses support for peace talks, while maintaining robust economic ties that help Russia offset Western sanctions. Chinese President Xi Jinping also attended the Russian Victory Day parade in Moscow on 9 May 2025, as part of a state visit to Russia.
Oleg Ivashchenko, head of Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service, said that China supplies machine tools, special chemicals, gunpowder and components specifically for military enterprises to 20 Russian factories.
The intelligence chief said his agency documented at least five instances of aviation cooperation with China during 2024-2025. These cases involved equipment, spare parts and documentation. Six separate incidents involved large deliveries of special chemicals.
Chinese components dominate Russian drone production. Ivashchenko reported that 80% of critical electronics for Russian drones had Chinese origins at the start of this year.
“There are substitutions, deception in names, shell companies through which everything necessary for microelectronics production goes from China to Russia,” Ivashchenko said.
The intelligence revelations support earlier claims by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In April, Zelenskyy said Ukrainian intelligence services obtained evidence of China-Russia cooperation in weapons supplies.
“Under Chinese weapons in Russia, I mean gunpowder and artillery,” Zelenskyy said at the time. He added that China was helping manufacture weapons inside Russia itself.
Chinese officials have denied providing weapons to either side in the war. Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian said China “not only does not provide lethal weapons to any party, but also strictly controls dual-use goods” that could be used for weapons production.
Zelenskyy responded by adding several Chinese companies to Ukraine’s sanctions list. These companies were involved in production of Iskander missiles, according to the Ukrainian president.
As Rome prepared to select a new pope, few beyond Vatican insiders were focused on what the transition would mean for the Catholic Church's stance on artificial intelligence.
Yet Pope Francis has established the Church as an erudite, insightful voice on AI ethics. "Does it serve to satisfy the needs of humanity to improve the well-being and integral development of people?”” he asked G7 leaders last year, “Or does it, rather, serve to enrich and increase the already high power of the few technological giants despite the dangers to humanity?"
Francis – and the Vatican at large – had called for meaningful regulation in a world where few institutions dared challenge the tech giants.
During the last months of Francis’s papacy, Silicon Valley, aided by a pliant U.S. government, has ramped up its drive to rapidly consolidate power.
OpenAI is expanding globally, tech CEOs are becoming a key component of presidential diplomatic missions, and federal U.S. lawmakers are attempting to effectively deregulate AI for the next decade.
For those tracking the collision between technological and religious power, one question looms large: Will the Vatican continue to be one of the few global institutions willing to question Silicon Valley's vision of our collective future?
Memories of watching the chimney on television during Pope Benedict’s election had captured my imagination as a child brought up in a secular, Jewish-inflected household. I longed to see that white smoke in person. The rumors in Rome last Thursday morning were that the matter wouldn’t be settled that day. So I was furious when I was stirred from my desk in the afternoon by the sound of pealing bells all over Rome. “Habemus papam!” I heard an old nonna call down to her husband in the courtyard.
As I heard the bells of Rome hailing a new pope toll last Thursday I sprinted out onto the street and joined people streaming from all over the city in the direction of St. Peter’s. In recent years, the time between white smoke and the new pope’s arrival on the balcony was as little as forty-five minutes. People poured over bridges and up the Via della Conciliazione towards the famous square. Among the rabble I spotted a couple of friars darting through the crowd, making speedier progress than anyone, their white cassocks flapping in the wind. Together, the friars and I made it through the security checkpoints and out into the square just as a great roar went up.
The initial reaction to the announcement that Robert Francis Prevost would be the next pope, with the name Leo XIV, was subdued. Most people around me hadn’t heard of him — he wasn’t one of the favored cardinals, he wasn’t Italian, and we couldn’t even Google him, because there were so many people gathered that no one’s phones were working. A young boy managed to get on the phone to his mamma, and she related the information about Prevost to us via her son. Americano, she said. From Chicago.
A nun from an order in Tennessee piped up that she had met Prevost once. She told us that he was mild-mannered and kind, that he had lived in Peru, and that he was very internationally-minded. “The point is, it’s a powerful American voice in the world, who isn’t Trump,” one American couple exclaimed to our little corner of the crowd.
It only took a few hours before Trump supporters, led by former altar boy Steve Bannon, realized this American pope wouldn’t be a MAGA pope. Leo XIV had posted on X in February, criticizing JD Vance, the Trump administration’s most prominent Catholic.
"I mean it's kind of jaw-dropping," Bannon told the BBC. "It is shocking to me that a guy could be selected to be the Pope that had had the Twitter feed and the statements he's had against American senior politicians."
Laura Loomer, a prominent far-right pro-Trump activist aired her own misgivings on X: “He is anti-Trump, anti-MAGA, pro-open borders, and a total Marxist like Pope Francis.”
As I walked home with everybody else that night – with the friars, the nuns, the pilgrims, the Romans, the tourists caught up in the action – I found myself thinking about our "Captured" podcast series, which I've spent the past year working on. In our investigation of AI's growing influence, we documented how tech leaders have created something akin to a new religion, with its own prophets, disciples, and promised salvation.
Walking through Rome's ancient streets, the dichotomy struck me: here was the oldest continuous institution on earth selecting its leader, while Silicon Valley was rapidly establishing what amounts to a competing belief system.
Would this new pope, taking the name of Leo — deliberately evoking Leo XIII who steered the church through the disruptions of the Industrial Revolution — stand against this present-day technological transformation that threatens to reshape what it means to be human?
I didn't have to wait long to find out. In his address to the College of Cardinals on Saturday, Pope Leo XIV said: "In our own day, the Church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching, in response to another industrial revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defence of human dignity, justice and labor."
Hours before the new pope was elected, I spoke with Molly Kinder, a fellow at the Brookings institution who’s an expert in AI and labor policy. Her research on the Vatican, labour, and AI was published with Brookings following Pope Francis’s death.
She described how the Catholic Church has a deep-held belief in the dignity of work — and how AI evangelists’ promise to create a post-work society with artificial intelligence is at odds with that.
“Pope John Paul II wrote something that I found really fascinating. He said, ‘work makes us more human.’ And Silicon Valley is basically racing to create a technology that will replace humans at work,” Kinder, who was raised Catholic, told me. “What they're endeavoring to do is disrupt some of the very core tenets of how we've interpreted God's mission for what makes us human.”
A version of this story was published in this week’s Coda Currents newsletter. Sign up here.
The post The Vatican challenges AI’s god complex appeared first on Coda Story.
Whoever becomes the next Pope will inherit not just the leadership of the Catholic Church but a remarkably sophisticated approach to technology — one that in many ways outpaces governments worldwide. While Silicon Valley preaches Artificial Intelligence as a quasi-religious force capable of saving humanity, the Vatican has been developing theological arguments to push back against this narrative.
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In the hours after Pope Francis died on Easter Monday, I went, like thousands of others in Rome, straight to St Peter's Square to witness the city in mourning as the basilica's somber bell tolled.
Just three days before, on Good Friday, worshippers in the eternal city proceeded, by candlelight, through the ruins of the Colosseum, as some of the Pope's final meditations were read to them. "When technology tempts us to feel all powerful, remind us," the leader of the service called out. "We are clay in your hands," the crowd responded in unison.
As our world becomes ever more governed by tech, the Pope's meditations are a reminder of our flawed, common humanity. We have built, he warned, "a world of calculation and algorithms, of cold logic and implacable interests." These turned out to be his last public words on technology. Right until the end, he called on his followers to think hard about how we're being captured by the technology around us. "How I would like for us to look less at screens and look each other in the eyes more!"
Faith vs. the new religion
Unlike politicians who often struggle to grasp AI's technical complexity, the Vatican has leveraged its centuries of experience with faith, symbols, and power to recognize AI for what it increasingly represents: not just a tool, but a competing belief system with its own prophets, promises of salvation, and demands for devotion.
In February 2020, the Vatican's Pontifical Academy for Life published the Rome Call for AI ethics, arguing that "AI systems must be conceived, designed and implemented to serve and protect human beings and the environment in which they live." And in January of this year, the Vatican released a document called Antiqua et Nova – one of its most comprehensive statements to date on AI – that warned we're in danger of worshipping AI as a God, or as an idol.
Our investigation into Silicon Valley's cult-like movement
I first became interested in the Vatican's perspective on AI while working on our Audible podcast series "Captured" with Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie. In our year-long investigation, we discovered how Silicon Valley's AI pioneers have adopted quasi-religious language to describe their products and ambitions — with some tech leaders explicitly positioning themselves as prophets creating a new god.
In our reporting, we documented tech leaders like Bryan Johnson speaking literally about "creating God in the form of superintelligence," billionaire investors discussing how to "live forever" through AI, and founders talking about building all-knowing, all-powerful machines that will free us from suffering and propel us into utopia. One founder told us their goal was to install "all human knowledge into every human" through brain-computer interfaces — in other words, make us all omniscient.
Nobel laureate Maria Ressa, whom I spoke with recently, told me she had warned Pope Francis about the dangers of algorithms designed to promote lies and disinformation. "Francis understood the impact of lies," she said. She explained to the Pope how Facebook had destroyed the political landscape in the Philippines, where the platform’s engagement algorithms allowed disinformation to spread like wildfire. "I said — 'this is literally an incentive structure that is rewarding lies.'"
According to Ressa, AI evangelists in Silicon Valley are acquiring "the power of gods without the wisdom of God." It is power, she said, "that is in the hands of men whose arrogance prevents them from seeing the impact of rolling out technology that's not safe for their kids."
The battle for humanity's future
The Vatican has always understood how to use technology, engineering and spectacle to harness devotion and wield power — you only have to walk into St Peter’s Basilica to understand that. I spoke to a Vatican priest, on his way to Rome to pay his respects to the Pope. He told me why the Vatican understands the growing power of artificial intelligence so well. "We know perfectly well," he said, "that certain structures can become divinities. In the end, technology should be a tool for living — it should not be the end of man."
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I grew up in rural Idaho in the late 80s and early 90s. My childhood was idyllic. I’m the oldest of five children. My father was an engineer-turned-physician, and my mother was a musician — she played the violin and piano. We lived in an amazing community, with great schools, dear friends and neighbors. There was lots of skiing, biking, swimming, tennis, and time spent outdoors.
If something was very difficult, I was taught that you just had to reframe it as a small or insignificant moment compared to the vast eternities and infinities around us. It was a Mormon community, and we were a Mormon family, part of generations of Mormons. I can trace my ancestry back to the early Mormon settlers. Our family were very observant: going to church every Sunday, and deeply faithful to the beliefs and tenets of the Mormon Church.
There's a belief in Mormonism: "As man is, God once was. As God is, man may become." And since God is perfect, the belief is that we too can one day become perfect.
We believed in perfection. And we were striving to be perfect—realizing that while we couldn't be perfect in this life, we should always attempt to be. We worked for excellence in everything we did.
It was an inspiring idea to me, but growing up in a world where I felt perfection was always the expectation was also tough.
In a way, I felt like there were two of me. There was this perfect person that I had to play and that everyone loved. And then there was this other part of me that was very disappointed by who I was—frustrated, knowing I wasn't living up to those same standards. I really felt like two people.
This perfectionism found its way into many of my pursuits. I loved to play the cello. Yo-Yo Ma was my idol. I played quite well and had a fabulous teacher. At 14, I became the principal cellist for our all-state orchestra, and later played in the World Youth Symphony at Interlochen Arts Camp and in a National Honors Orchestra. I was part of a group of kids who were all playing at the highest level. And I was driven. I wanted to be one of the very, very best.
I went on to study at Northwestern in Chicago and played there too. I was the youngest cellist in the studio of Hans Jensen, and was surrounded by these incredible musicians. We played eight hours a day, time filled with practice, orchestra, chamber music, studio, and lessons. I spent hours and hours working through the tiniest movements of the hand, individual shifts, weight, movement, repetition, memory, trying to find perfect intonation, rhythm, and expression. I loved that I could control things, practice, and improve. I could find moments of perfection.
I remember one night being in the practice rooms, walking down the hall, and hearing some of the most beautiful playing I'd ever heard. I peeked in and didn’t recognize the cellist. They were a former student now warming up for an audition with the Chicago Symphony.
Later on, I heard they didn’t get it. I remember thinking, "Oh my goodness, if you can play that well and still not make it..." It kind of shattered my worldview—it really hit me that I would never be the very best. There was so much talent, and I just wasn't quite there.
I decided to step away from the cello as a profession. I’d play for fun, but not make it my career. I’d explore other interests and passions.
There's a belief in Mormonism: "As man is, God once was. As God is, man may become."
As I moved through my twenties, my relationship with Mormonism started to become strained. When you’re suddenly 24, 25, 26 and not married, that's tough. Brigham Young [the second and longest-serving prophet of the Mormon Church] said that if you're not married by 30, you're a menace to society. It just became more and more awkward to be involved. I felt like people were wondering, “What’s wrong with him?”
Eventually, I left the church. And I suddenly felt like a complete person — it was a really profound shift. There weren’t two of me anymore. I didn’t have to put on a front. Now that I didn’t have to worry about being that version of perfect, I could just be me.
But the desire for perfection was impossible for me to kick entirely. I was still excited about striving, and I think a lot of this energy and focus then poured into my work and career as a designer and researcher. I worked at places like the Mayo Clinic, considered by many to be the world’s best hospital. I studied in London at the Royal College of Art, where I received my master’s on the prestigious Design Interactions course exploring emerging technology, futures, and speculative design. I found I loved working with the best, and being around others who were striving for perfection in similar ways. It was thrilling.
One of the big questions I started to explore during my master's studies in design, and I think in part because I felt this void of meaning after leaving Mormonism, was “what is important to strive for in life?” What should we be perfecting? What is the goal of everything? Or in design terms, “What’s the design intent of everything?”
I spent a huge amount of time with this question, and in the end I came to the conclusion that it’s happiness. Happiness is the goal. We should strive in life for happiness. Happiness is the design intent of everything. It is the idea that no matter what we do, no matter what activity we undertake, we do it because we believe doing it or achieving the thing will make us better off or happier. This fit really well with the beliefs I grew up with, but now I had a new, non-religious way in to explore it.
The question then became: What is happiness? I came to the conclusion that happiness is chemical—an evolved sensation that indicates when our needs in terms of survival have been met. You're happy when you have a wonderful meal because your body has evolved to identify good food as improving your chances of survival. The same is true for sleep, exercise, sex, family, friendships, meaning, purpose–everything can be seen through this evolutionary happiness lens.
So if happiness evolved as the signal for survival, then I wanted to optimize my survival to optimize that feeling. What would it look like if I optimized the design of my life for happiness? What could I change to feel the most amount of happiness for the longest amount of time? What would life look like if I lived perfectly with this goal in mind?
I started measuring my happiness on a daily basis, and then making changes to my life to see how I might improve it. I took my evolutionary basic needs for survival and organized them in terms of how quickly their absence would kill me as a way to prioritize interventions.
Breathing was first on the list — we can’t last long without it. So I tried to optimize my breathing. I didn’t really know how to breathe or how powerful breathing is—how it changes the way we feel, bringing calm and peace, or energy and alertness. So I practiced breathing.
The optimizations continued, diet, sleep, exercise, material possessions, friends, family, purpose, along with a shedding of any behaviour or activity that I couldn’t see meaningfully improving my happiness. For example, I looked at clothing and fashion, and couldn’t see any real happiness impact. So I got rid of almost all of my clothing, and have worn the same white t-shirts and grey or blue jeans for the past 15 years.
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I got involved in the Quantified Self (QS) movement and started tracking my heart rate, blood pressure, diet, sleep, exercise, cognitive speed, happiness, creativity, and feelings of purpose. I liked the data. I’d go to QS meet-ups and conferences with others doing self experiments to optimize different aspects of their lives, from athletic performance, to sleep, to disease symptoms.
I also started to think about longevity. If I was optimizing for happiness through these evolutionary basics, how long could one live if these needs were perfectly satisfied? I started to put on my websites – “copyright 2103”. That’s when I’ll be 125. That felt like a nice goal, and something that I imagined could be completely possible — especially if every aspect of my life was optimized, along with future advancements in science and medicine.
In 2022, some 12 years later, I came across Bryan Johnson. A successful entrepreneur, also ex-Mormon, optimizing his health and longevity through data. It was familiar. He had come to this kind of life optimization in a slightly different way and for different reasons, but I was so excited by what he was doing. I thought, "This is how I’d live if I had unlimited funds."
He said he was optimizing every organ and body system: What does our heart need? What does our brain need? What does our liver need? He was optimizing the biomarkers for each one. He said he believed in data, honesty and transparency, and following where the data led. He was open to challenging societal norms. He said he had a team of doctors, had reviewed thousands of studies to develop his protocols. He said every calorie had to fight for its life to be in his body. He suggested everything should be third-party tested. He also suggested that in our lifetime advances in medicine would allow people to live radically longer lives, or even to not die.
These ideas all made sense to me. There was also a kind of ideal of perfect and achieving perfection that resonated with me. Early on, Bryan shared his protocols and data online. And a lot of people tried his recipes and workouts, experimenting for themselves. I did too. It also started me thinking again more broadly about how to live better, now with my wife and young family. For me this was personal, but also exciting to think about what a society might look like when we strived at scale for perfection in this way. Bryan seemed to be someone with the means and platform to push this conversation.
I think all of my experience to this point was the set up for, ultimately, my deep disappointment in Bryan Johnson and my frustrating experience as a participant in his BP5000 study.
In early 2024 there was a callout for people to participate in a study to look at how Bryan’s protocols might improve their health and wellbeing. He said he wanted to make it easier to follow his approach, and he started to put together a product line of the same supplements that he used. It was called Blueprint – and the first 5000 people to test it out would be called the Blueprint 5000, or BP5000. We would measure our biomarkers and follow his supplement regime for three months and then measure again to see its effects at a population level. I thought it would be a fun experiment, participating in real citizen science moving from n=1 to n=many. We had to apply, and there was a lot of excitement among those of us who were selected. They were a mix of people who had done a lot of self-quantification, nutritionists, athletes, and others looking to take first steps into better personal health. We each had to pay about $2,000 to participate, covering Blueprint supplements and the blood tests, and we were promised that all the data would be shared and open-sourced at the end of the study.
The study began very quickly, and there were red flags almost immediately around the administration of the study, with product delivery problems, defective product packaging, blood test problems, and confusion among participants about the protocols. There wasn’t even a way to see if participants died during the study, which felt weird for work focused on longevity. But we all kind of rolled with it. We wanted to make it work.
We took baseline measurements, weighed ourselves, measured body composition, uploaded Whoop or Apple Watch data, did blood tests covering 100s of biomarkers, and completed a number of self-reported studies on things like sexual health and mental health. I loved this type of self-measurement.
Participants connected over Discord, comparing notes, and posting about our progress.
Right off, some effects were incredible. I had a huge amount of energy. I was bounding up the stairs, doing extra pull-ups without feeling tired. My joints felt smooth. I noticed I was feeling bulkier — I had more muscle definition as my body fat percentage started to drop.
There were also some strange effects. For instance, I noticed in a cold shower, I could feel the cold, but I didn’t feel any urgency to get out. Same with the sauna. I had weird sensations of deep focus and vibrant, vivid vision. I started having questions—was this better? Had I deadened sensitivity to pain? What exactly was happening here?
Then things went really wrong. My ears started ringing — high-pitched and constant. I developed Tinnitus. And my sleep got wrecked. I started waking up at two, three, four AM, completely wired, unable to turn off my mind. It was so bad I had to stop all of the Blueprint supplements after only a few weeks.
On the Discord channel where we were sharing our results, I saw Bryan talking positively about people having great experiences with the stack. But when I or anyone else mentioned adverse side effects, the response tended to be: “wait until the study is finished and see if there’s a statistical effect to worry about."
So positive anecdotes were fine, but when it came to negative ones, suddenly, we needed large-scale data. That really put me off. I thought the whole point was to test efficacy and safety in a data-driven way. And the side effects were not ignorable.
Many of us were trying to help each other figure out what interventions in the stack were driving different side effects, but we were never given the “1,000+ scientific studies” that Blueprint was supposedly built upon which would have had side-effect reporting. We struggled even to get a complete list of the interventions that were in the stack from the Blueprint team, with numbers evolving from 67 to 74 over the course of the study. It was impossible to tell which ingredient in which products was doing what to people.
We were told to no longer discuss side-effects in the Discord but email Support with issues. I was even kicked off the Discord at one point for “fear mongering” because I was encouraging people to share the side effects they were experiencing.
The Blueprint team were also making changes to the products mid-study, changing protein sources and allulose levels, leaving people with months’ worth of expensive essentially defective products, and surely impacting study results.
When Bryan then announced they were launching the BP10000, allowing more people to buy his products, even before the BP5000 study had finished, and without addressing all of the concerns about side effects, it suddenly became clear to me and many others that we had just been part of a launch and distribution plan for a new supplement line, not participants in a scientific study.
Bryan has not still to this day, a year later, released the full BP5000 data set to the participants as he promised to do. In fact he has ghosted participants and refuses to answer questions about the BP5000. He blocked me on X recently for bringing it up. I suspect that this is because the data is really bad, and my worries line up with reporting from the New York Times where leaked internal Blueprint data suggests many of the BP5000 participants experienced some negative side effects, with some participants even having serious drops in testosterone or becoming pre-diabetic.
I’m still angry today about how this all went down. I’m angry that I was taken in by someone I now feel was a snake oil salesman. I’m angry that the marketing needs of Bryan’s supplement business and his need to control his image overshadowed the opportunity to generate some real science. I’m angry that Blueprint may be hurting some people. I’m angry because the way Bryan Johnson has gone about this grates on my sense of perfection.
Bryan’s call to “Don’t Die” now rings in my ears as “Don’t Lie” every time I hear it. I hope the societal mechanisms for truth will be able to help him make a course correction. I hope he will release the BP5000 data set and apologize to participants. But Bryan Johnson feels to me like an unstoppable marketing force at this point — full A-list influencer status — and sort of untouchable, with no use for those of us interested in the science and data.
This experience has also had me reflecting on and asking bigger questions of the longevity movement and myself.
We’re ignoring climate breakdown. The latest indications suggest we’re headed toward three degrees of warming. These are societal collapse numbers, in the next 15 years. When there are no bees and no food, catastrophic fires and floods, your Heart Rate Variability doesn’t really matter. There’s a sort of “bunker mentality” prevalent in some of the longevity movement, and wider tech — we can just ignore it, and we’ll magically come out on the other side, sleep scores intact.
The question then became: What is happiness? I came to the conclusion that happiness is chemical—an evolved sensation that indicates when our needs in terms of survival have been met.
I’ve also started to think that calls to live forever are perhaps misplaced, and that in fact we have evolved to die. Death is a good thing. A feature, not a bug. It allows for new life—we need children, young people, new minds who can understand this context and move us forward. I worry that older minds are locked into outdated patterns of thinking, mindsets trained in and for a world that no longer exists, thinking that destroyed everything in the first place, and which is now actually detrimental to progress. The life cycle—bringing in new generations with new thinking—is the mechanism our species has evolved to function within. Survival is and should be optimized for the species, not the individual.
I love thinking about the future. I love spending time there, understanding what it might look like. It is a huge part of my design practice. But as much as I love the future, the most exciting thing to me is the choices we make right now in each moment. All of that information from our future imaginings should come back to help inform current decision-making and optimize the choices we have now. But I don’t see this happening today. Our current actions as a society seem totally disconnected from any optimized, survivable future. We’re not learning from the future. We’re not acting for the future.
We must engage with all outcomes, positive and negative. We're seeing breakthroughs in many domains happening at an exponential rate, especially in AI. But, at the same time, I see job displacement, huge concentration of wealth, and political systems that don't seem capable of regulating or facilitating democratic conversations about these changes. Creators must own it all. If you build AI, take responsibility for the lost job, and create mechanisms to share wealth. If you build a company around longevity and make promises to people about openness and transparency, you have to engage with all the positive outcomes and negative side effects, no matter what they are.
I’m sometimes overwhelmed by our current state. My striving for perfection and optimizations throughout my life have maybe been a way to give me a sense of control in a world where at a macro scale I don’t actually have much power. We are in a moment now where a handful of individuals and companies will get to decide what’s next. A few governments might be able to influence those decisions. Influencers wield enormous power. But most of us will just be subject to and participants in all that happens. And then we’ll die.
But until then my ears are still ringing.
This article was put together based on interviews J.Paul Neeley did with Isobel Cockerell and Christopher Wylie, as part of their reporting for CAPTURED, our new audio series on how Silicon Valley’s AI prophets are choosing our future for us. You can listen now on Audible.
This story is part of “Captured”, our special issue in which we ask whether AI, as it becomes integrated into every part of our lives, is now a belief system. Who are the prophets? What are the commandments? Is there an ethical code? How do the AI evangelists imagine the future? And what does that future mean for the rest of us?
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In April last year I was in Perugia, at the annual international journalism festival. I was sitting in a panel session about whether AI marked the end of journalism, when a voice note popped up on my Signal.
It came from Christopher Wylie. He’s a data scientist and the whistleblower who cracked open the Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018. I had just started working with him on a new investigation into AI. Chris was supposed to be meeting me, but he had found himself trapped in Dubai in a party full of Silicon Valley venture capitalists.
“I don’t know if you can hear me — I’m in the toilet at this event, and people here are talking about longevity, how to live forever, but also prepping for when people revolt and when society gets completely undermined,” he had whispered into his phone. “You have in another part of the world, a bunch of journalists talking about how to save democracy. And here, you've got a bunch of tech guys thinking about how to live past democracy and survive.”
A massive storm and a once-in-a-generation flood had paralyzed Dubai when Chris was on a layover on his way to Perugia. He couldn’t leave. And neither could the hundreds of tech guys who were there for a crypto summit. The freakish weather hadn’t stopped them partying, Chris told me over a frantic Zoom call.
“You're wading through knee-deep water, people are screaming everywhere, and then… What do all these bros do? They organize a party. It's like the world is collapsing outside and yet you go inside and it's billionaires and centimillionaires having a party,” he said. “Dubai right now is a microcosm of the world. The world is collapsing outside and the people are partying.”
Chris and I eventually managed to meet up. And for over a year we worked together on a podcast that asks what is really going on inside the tech world. We looked at how the rest of us — journalists, artists, nurses, businesses, even governments — are being captured by big tech’s ambitions for the future and how we can fight back.
Mercy was a content moderator for Meta. She was paid around a dollar an hour for work that left her so traumatized that she couldn't sleep. And when she tried to unionize, she was laid off.
Our reporting took us around the world from the lofty hills of Twin Peaks in San Francisco to meet the people building AI models, to the informal settlements of Kenya to meet the workers training those models.
One of these people was Mercy Chimwani, who we visited in her makeshift house with no roof on the outskirts of Nairobi. There was mud beneath our feet, and above you could see the rainclouds through a gaping hole where the unfinished stairs met the sky. When it rained, Mercy told us, water ran right through the house. It’s hard to believe, but she worked for Meta.
Mercy was a content moderator, hired by the middlemen Meta used to source employees. Her job was to watch the internet’s most horrific images and video – training the company’s system so it can automatically filter out such content before the rest of us are exposed to it.
She was paid around a dollar an hour for work that left her so traumatized that she couldn’t sleep. And when she and her colleagues tried to unionize, she was laid off. Mercy was part of the invisible, ignored workforce in the Global South that enables our frictionless life online for little reward.
Of course, we went to the big houses too — where the other type of tech worker lives. The huge palaces made of glass and steel in San Francisco, where the inhabitants believe the AI they are building will one day help them live forever, and discover everything there is to know about the universe.
In Twin Peaks, we spoke to Jeremy Nixon, the creator of AGI House San Francisco (AGI for Artificial General Intelligence). Nixon described an apparently utopian future, a place where we never have to work, where AI does everything for us, and where we can install the sum of human knowledge into our brains. “The intention is to allow every human to know everything that’s known,” he told me.
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Later that day, we went to a barbecue in Cupertino and got talking to Alan Boehme, once a chief technology officer for some of the biggest companies in the world, and now an investor in AI startups. Boehme told us how important it was, from his point of view, that tech wasn’t stymied by government regulation. “We have to be worried that people are going to over-regulate it. Europe is the worst, to be honest with you,” he said. “Let's look at how we can benefit society and how this can help lead the world as opposed to trying to hold it back.”
I asked him if regulation wasn’t part of the reason we have democratically elected governments, to ensure that all people are kept safe, that some people aren’t left behind by the pace of change? Shouldn’t the governments we elect be the ones deciding whether we regulate AI and not the people at this Cupertino barbecue?
“You sound like you're from Sweden,” Boehme responded. “I'm sorry, that's social democracy. That is not what we are here in the U. S. This country is based on a Constitution. We're not based on everybody being equal and holding people back. No, we're not in Sweden.”
As we reported for the podcast, we came to a gradual realization – what’s being built in Silicon Valley isn’t just artificial intelligence, it’s a way of life — even a religion. And it’s a religion we might not have any choice but to join.
In January, the Vatican released a statement in which it argued that we’re in danger of worshiping AI as God. It's an idea we'd discussed with Judy Estrin, who worked on building some of the earliest iterations of the internet. As a young researcher at Stanford in the 1970s, Estrin was building some of the very first networked connections. She is no technophobe, fearful of the future, but she is worried about the zealotry she says is taking over Silicon Valley.
What if they truly believe humans are replaceable, that traditional concepts of humanity are outdated, that a technological "god" should supersede us? These aren't just ideological positions – they're the foundations for the world being built around us.
“If you worship innovation, if you worship anything, you can't take a step back and think about guardrails,” she said about the unquestioning embrace of AI. “So we, from a leadership perspective, are very vulnerable to techno populists who come out and assert that this is the only way to make something happen.”
The first step toward reclaiming our lost agency, as AI aims to capture every facet of our world, is simply to pay attention. I've been struck by how rarely we actually listen to what tech leaders are explicitly saying about their vision of the future.
There's a tendency to dismiss their most extreme statements as hyperbole or marketing, but what if they're being honest? What if they truly believe humans, or at least most humans, are replaceable, that traditional concepts of humanity are outdated, that a technological "god" should supersede us? These aren't just ideological positions – they're the foundations for the world being built around us right now.
In our series, we explore artificial intelligence as something that affects our culture, our jobs, our media and our politics. But we should also ask what tech founders and engineers are really building with AI, or what they think they’re building. Because if their vision of society does not have a place for us in it, we should be ready to reclaim our destiny – before our collective future is captured.
Our audio documentary series, CAPTURED: The Secret Behind Silicon Valley’s AI Takeover is available now on Audible. Do please tune in, and you can dig deeper into our stories and the people we met during the reporting below.
This story is part of “Captured”, our special issue in which we ask whether AI, as it becomes integrated into every part of our lives, is now a belief system. Who are the prophets? What are the commandments? Is there an ethical code? How do the AI evangelists imagine the future? And what does that future mean for the rest of us? You can listen to the Captured audio series on Audible now.
The post Captured: how Silicon Valley is building a future we never chose appeared first on Coda Story.
This week, as DeepSeek, a free AI-powered chatbot from China, embarrassed American tech giants and panicked investors, sending global markets tumbling, investor Marc Andreessen described its emergence as "AI's Sputnik moment." That is, the moment when self-belief and confidence tips over into hubris. It was not just stock prices that plummeted. The carefully constructed story of American technological supremacy also took a deep plunge.
But perhaps the real shock should be that Silicon Valley was shocked at all.
For years, Silicon Valley and its cheerleaders spread the narrative of inevitable American dominance of the artificial intelligence industry. From the "Why China Can't Innovate" cover story in the Harvard Business Review to the breathless reporting on billion-dollar investments in AI, U.S. media spent years building an image of insurmountable Western technological superiority. Even this week, when Wired reported on the "shock, awe, and questions" DeepSeek had sparked, the persistent subtext seemed to be that technological efficiency from unexpected quarters was somehow fundamentally illegitimate.
“In the West, our sense of exceptionalism is truly our greatest weakness,” says data analyst Christopher Wylie, author of MindF*ck, who famously blew the whistle on Cambridge Analytica in 2017.
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That arrogance was on full display just last year when OpenAI's Sam Altman, speaking to an audience in India, declared: "It's totally hopeless to compete with us. You can try and it's your job to try but I believe it is hopeless." He was dismissing the possibility that teams outside Silicon Valley could build substantial AI systems with limited resources.
There are still questions over whether DeepSeek had access to more computing power than it is admitting. Scale AI chief executive Alexandr Wong said in a recent interview that the Chinese company had access to thousands more of the highest grade chips than people know about, despite U.S. export controls. What's clear, though, is that Altman didn't anticipate that a competitor would simply refuse to play by the rules he was trying to set and would instead reimagine the game itself.
By developing an AI model that matches—and in many ways surpasses—American equivalents, DeepSeek challenged the Silicon Valley story that technological innovation demands massive resources and minimal oversight. While companies like OpenAI have poured hundreds of billions into massive data centers—with the Stargate project alone pledging an “initial investment” of $100 billion—DeepSeek demonstrated a fundamentally different path to innovation.
"For the first time in public, they've provided an efficient way to train reasoning models," explains Thomas Cao, professor of technology policy at Tufts University. "The technical detail is that they've come up with a way to do reinforcement learning without supervision. You don't have to hand-label a lot of data. That makes training much more efficient."
By developing an AI model that matches—and in many ways surpasses—American equivalents, DeepSeek challenged the Silicon Valley story that technological innovation demands massive resources and minimal oversight.
For the American media, which has drunk the Silicon Valley Kool Aid, the DeepSeek story is a hard one to stomach. For a long time, Wylie argues, while countries in Asia made massive technological breakthroughs, the story commonly told to the American people focused on American tech exceptionalism.
An alternative approach, Wylie says, would be to see and “acknowledge that China is doing good things we can learn from without meaning that we have to adopt their system. Things can exist in parallel.” But instead, he adds, the mainstream media followed the politicians down the rabbit hole of focusing on the "China threat."
These geopolitical fears have helped Big Tech shield itself from genuine competition and regulatory scrutiny. The narrative of a Cold War style “AI race” with China has also fed the assumption that a major technological power can be bullied into submission through trade restrictions.
That assumption has also crumpled. The U.S. has spent the past two years attempting to curtail China's AI development through increasingly strict controls on advanced semiconductors. These restrictions, which began under Biden in 2022 and were significantly expanded last week under Trump, were designed to prevent Chinese companies from accessing the most advanced chips needed for AI development.
DeepSeek developed its model using older generation chips stockpiled before the restrictions took effect, and its breakthrough has been held up as an example of genuine, bootstrap innovation. But Professor Cao cautions against reading too much into how export controls have catalysed development and innovation at DeepSeek. "If there had been no export control requirements,” he said, “DeepSeek could have been able to do things even more efficiently and faster. We don't see the counterfactual."
DeepSeek is a direct rebuke to both Western assumptions about Chinese innovation and the methods the West has used to curtail it.
As millions of Americans downloaded DeepSeek, making it the most downloaded app in the U.S., OpenAI’s Steven Heidel peevishly claimed that using it would mean giving away data to the Chinese Communist Party. Lawmakers too have warned about national security risks and dozens of stories like this one echoed suggestions that the app could be sending U.S. data to China.
Security concers aside, what really sets DeepSeek apart from its Western counterparts is not just efficiency of the model, but also the fact that it is open source. Which, counter-intuitively, makes a Beijing-funded app more democratic than its Silicon Valley predecessors.
In the heated discourse surrounding technological innovation, "open source" has become more than just a technical term—it's a philosophy of transparency. Unlike proprietary models where code is a closely guarded corporate secret, open source invites global scrutiny and collective improvement.
DeepSeek is a direct rebuke to Western assumptions about Chinese innovation and the methods the West has used to curtail it.
At its core, open source means that the source code of a software is made freely available for anyone to view, modify, and distribute. When a technology is open source, users can download the entire code, run it on their own servers, and verify every line of its functionality. For consumers and technologists alike, open source means the ability to understand, modify, and improve technology without asking permission. It's a model that prioritizes collective advancement over corporate control. Already, for instance, the Chinese tech behemoth Alibaba has released a new version of its own large language model that it says is an upgrade on DeepSpeak.
Unlike ChatGPT or any other Western AI system, DeepSource can be run locally without giving away any data. "Despite the media fear-mongering, the irony is DeepSeek is now open source and could be implemented in a far more privacy-preserving way than anything offered by Meta or OpenAI," Wylie says. “If Sam Altman open sourced OpenAI, we wouldn’t look at it with the same skepticism, he would be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize."
The open-source nature of DeepSeek is a huge part of the disruption it has caused. It challenges Silicon Valley's entire proprietary model and challenges our collective assumptions about both AI development and global competition. Not surprisingly, part of Silicon Valley’s response has been to complain that Chinese companies are using American companies’ intellectual property, even as their own large language models have been built by consuming vast amounts of information without permission.
This counterintuitive strategy of openness coming from an authoritarian state also gives China a massive soft power win that it will translate into geopolitical brownie points. Just as TikTok's algorithms outmaneuvered Instagram and YouTube by focusing on accessibility over profit, DeepSeek, which is currently topping iPhone downloads, represents another moment where what's better for users—open-source, efficient, privacy-preserving—challenges what's better for the boardroom.
We are yet to see how DeepSeek will reroute the development of AI, but just as the original Sputnik moment galvanized American scientific innovation during the Cold War, DeepSeek could shake Silicon Valley out of its complacency. For Professor Cao the immediate lesson is that the US must reinvest in fundamental research or risk falling behind. For Wylie, the takeaway of the DeepSeek fallout in the US is more meta: There is no need for a new Cold War, he argues. “There will only be an AI war if we decide to have one.”
Additional reporting by Masho Lomashvili.
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