In the early morning hours of Jun. 6, the dam of the Nova Kakhovka hydroelectric power station (HPP)
was blown up in the Kherson Region of Ukraine.
This is the largest man-made disaster in Ukrainian history — since the 1986 Chernobyl accident.
Tens of thousands are thought to face imminent danger.
Evacuations are under way.
Surreal aerial footage has circulated on social media,
showing swans floating around a huge pond that used to be a large square in Nova Kakhovka.
As of this recording, there have been no reports of any fatalities or injuries.
The number of affected people isn’t known, either. But one thing is clear.
In a matter of hours, thousands of civilians lost their homes and property.
According to the U-Animalis charity, all the animals kept at the Nova Kakhovka Zoo have drowned, except that pair of swans.
Let’s analyze the two versions of this disaster.
However, the following disclaimer should be made.
Each man-made accident that has hit Ukraine over the past 15 months —
the blowing up of the Nova Kakhovka dam, the dam blast on the Irpin River,
or the ammonia leakage from damaged industrial facilities — has resulted from the war started on Feb. 24, 2022.
There are going to be multiple investigations into the killings of Ukrainians and the devastation of Ukrainian cities, towns,
and villages along with the flooding of large areas as well as air and soil pollution.
Each probe will shed light on new details, but a fair trial should be able to link these environmental disasters to the Russian invasion.
According to the decree issued by the Russian Government a week ago,
no technical investigations will be conducted into the accidents at hydrotechnical structures in the occupied areas of Ukraine.
That is, the Russian side won’t be looking into the cause behind the collapse of the dam.
Which didn't prevent Russia's Investigative Committee from launching a criminal probe,
and propagandists from making the accusations.
As of this recording, some expert comments claim that the dam gave way to water pressure.
The major factor was allegedly the damage inflicted last year, and nature finished it off.
The dam was indeed shelled. Here's one episode caught on camera.
However, we'll break down all possible scenarios.
Technically, two possible versions behind the Nova Kakhovka dam disaster, each of which has two variations.
Version 1. The dam was blown up by the Russians who are now controlling the part of the Kherson Region east of the Dnipro River.
What’s the evidence behind this theory?
The Russian army that retreated from Kherson and the entire right bank of the river is now defending the left bank.
Mining dams and bridges has been a common tactic employed
by a defending army with an eye to blowing them up once the enemy draws closer.
The Nova Kakhovka dam doubles as a bridge, too.
In fact, the Russian army NOT mining it would’ve been an odd move for them.
The Government's decree clears the Russian troops of any responsibility.
Officially, there's no war, and the miners plant an explosive into a civilian structure in an area that's been proclaimed part of Russia.
They are willing to detonate it. If they do, the episode won't be investigated.
The artificial flooding is a popular tactic for a retreating army
to halt the enemy’s advancements and temporarily swamp the territory.
his maneuver was used by the Netherlands as they opened the flood gates to thwart the advancing army.
One of the episodes of our WW2 docuseries mentioned the Dnipro HPP being blown up during the retreat in 1941.
On the other hand, no newsworthy Ukrainian advance in the Kherson Region has been reported over the past 24 hours.
At 12:15AM, Jun. 6, Gen. Igor Konashenkov, spokesman for the Russian defense Ministry, gave an emergency update.
According to it, the Ukrainian army tried to break through the lines of defense at the Vremivka ledge.
The ledge sits far away from the Nova Kakhovka HPP at the intersection of the Dnipropetrovsk,
Zaporizhzhia, and Donetsk regions of Ukraine.
Konashenkov’s unscheduled media appearance could’ve easily contributed to the rising tensions along the entire front-lines.
The Russian troops have been on pins and needles waiting for the Ukrainian army to start its offensive and deliver its first strike.
Unaware of where it may happen every soldier believes they could be the target.
Pro-war media have already whipped everyone into a frenzy several times, whereas Ukraine has yet to unleash their attack.
The morale of the Russian army has recently been on the decline.
Hardly had they taken Bakhmut in what was their only successful operation of the past year or so, when the DPR head said,
“The flanks are facing serious trouble in Bakhmut.”
On top of that, PMC Wagner kidnapped a lieutenant colonel who is Russian, mind you.
Armed saboteurs are going on a rampage in southern Russia following the Moscow drone strikes.
Memoirs of WW2 all agree on one thing.
Whenever the troops get disorganized, many commanding officers begin hallucinating the enemy landings,
both of paratroopers and water landing units.
Could the Russian troops near the Nova Kakhovka HPP hallucinate something like that?
Could they be falsely triggered into blowing up the dam?
On the one hand, there’s no evidence to back up this claim.
On the other hand, historical evidence points to this possibility.
The Russian bombing theory has a variation.
The recent moves of the Russian commanders — be it the regular army generals, Wagnerites, Kadyrovites, or suchlike —
show that they don’t work in unison.
They no longer have a single clear-cut goal.
Conversely, all of them are on a mission to exculpate themselves of the future failures.
Somebody else or an external force is to blame.
We don’t know for a fact what kind of defensive fortifications the Russian army has been setting up
on the left bank of the Dnipro River in the Kherson Region.
There’s no way of telling how the top brass assess their troops’
capabilities to hold on, given that regular soldiers clearly have no clue.
They won’t engage in admirable heroics as the defend themselves on foreign soil.
It can be assumed that the Russian command may order the flooding of their own defenses in the Kherson Region to furnish
an excuse for a retreat and impute it to external circumstances.
They’d be able to use this fact to explain away their subsequent failures.
Like, we built solid textbook defenses that would’ve allowed us to repel the Ukrainian offensive, but we couldn’t resist the flooding.
How are we to blame?
There’s no way we’re setting up a new line of defenses.
But the one that’s been flooded was pure gold, no cap.
This is clearly all speculative, and it isn't backed up by evidence.
But before we are presented with findings of any probes, we'll be dealing in such conjectures.
Version 2. The Ukrainian army has blown up the Nova Kakhovka dam.
This theory also has two possible scenarios.
Scenario 1. The Ukrainian army has deliberately destroyed the dam.
This one is hard to comment on.
It requires a serious examination that’ll show who benefits more from the flooding: the advancing army or the defending one.
One thing is clear.
It creates obstacles for both sides.
The Russian army may even sustain more damage since the left bank of the Dnipro River is lower than the right one.
Scenario 2. The dam has burst as a result of ceaseless shelling.
As I’ve already said, the Nova Kakhovka dam doubles as a bridge.
After the Russian troops had occupied Kherson and the west bank, three bridges were used as supply routes for the Russian army.
The Nova Kakhovka dam was one of them, and it was constantly shelled.
Therefore, the collapse may have been caused by the entirety of last year’s shelling.
This is a realistic theory, too.
No matter the timing of the collapse of the dam, we could’ve find some matches.
The coincidences outlined above can account for everything — and nothing.
However, there's one more version that's increasingly favored by experts.
An HPP is a complex engineering structure that requires rigorous maintenance.
his new version argues that the collapse may have been caused by the lack of proper water control in the reservoir and strictly
observed, timely release of water through the spillways.
The dam could quite literally burst as it failed to retain the amount of water there.
Therefore, according to this account, the dam collapsed as a result of the war and due to the lack of proper infrastructural
maintenance by the occupiers, and not as a result of military action.
How is to Blame? What’s the Next Move?
Whatever has triggered the disaster, examining the details may be quite misleading.
Ever since the “special operation” went sideways,
the Russian propaganda has been feeding the viewership a steady diet of mental painkillers.
Some propagandists still blame the Ukrainian army for the destroyed Ukrainian cities as they brazenly defended them.
Even some of the commenters on my channel claim,“Had Ukrainians taken the fight to the fields, cities would’ve been intact.
They are partly to blame!”
Such commenters and the speakers they trust may think of a war
as a bar brawl where gentlemanly fighters get outside to avoid property damage.
Is the Red Army to blame for the annihilation of Stalingrad?
The Stalingrad area was a steppe region, and yet, the bloody Soviets opted to take cover in residences.
The German airborne and tank forces would’ve been happy, too, if the Soviet marshals had taken their army to an open field.
Instead, they MacGyvered a fortress out of the city and totally disrespected the visiting Germans.
Literally every time a Russian missile hits a Ukrainian residential block,
the Russian propagandists blame the Ukrainian air defense systems.
There are “honest” propagandists, too, like Sergei Mardan.
On Vladimir Solovyov’s show, he admits to these strikes, going, “We have hit the residential block, isn’t it cool?”
But not everyone is that abominable.
His fellow propagandists claimed time and again that a Russian missile was minding its own business
when evil Ukrainian defenders hit it.
It swerved off and struck a residential structure.
By the same token, 80 years ago, our ancestors in Moscow and Leningrad should’ve been slamming the defenders,
“What the f**k d’you think you’re doing?
Don’t strike at German planes! They may end up crashing into people’s homes.”
As I speak, Russian media posts are mounting as they accuse — you’ve guessed it —
the Ukrainians of blowing up the Nova Kakhovka dam.
Starting Feb. 24, 2022, Ukrainians are to blame for every single thing,from the propaganda’s perspective.
The cynicism of Russian officials conflating the causes of the war with its effects is stunning.
True, it’s a shame Ukrainians refuse to wear white gloves while defending their territory against Putin-led invaders.
As of this recording, the cause of the collapse is unknown.
It may have been destroyed by the Russians who either were scared into doing this or deliberately blasted it
to avoid defending poorly built fortifications.
The Ukrainian army may also be the culprit.
It may have also followed from the fact that the dam was continuously shelled last year
as it was a major route for the Russian army in the Kherson Region.
These details do matter, but the big picture is different.
At the root of this disaster is the war itself.
Last time, when the Dnipro HPP was blown up, no one was engaging in guesswork.
Yes, the defenders did it. But the occupiers were to blame, nonetheless.
Russia will have to pay for the damage resulting from the blast.
Just as for the damage inflicted on power stations by cruise missiles and Shahed drones — Russia doesn’t deny those facts.
Bridges, dams, power stations, factories, and entire cities — all of these came as a result of decades-long tireless work of those
who were rebuilding Ukraine after the Nazi invasion.
It was done by millions of laborers, construction workers, engineers, scientists, and architects.
Today, all of this is being erased at the hands of one guy whose dirtiest job was one of an assistant to the mayor.
The damage he’s done will be paid for by the future generations of Russians.
The collapse of the dam will lead to 10s of thousands losing their homes and property, and some maybe even lives.
This stems from a savage and pointless invasion of Ukraine at the hands of Vladimir Putin.
The cause of the accident is dwarfed by the fact that if Putin hadn't sent his tanks there,
no one would be shelling this place over the next century.
I sincerely hope that an ongoing rescue operation will help save the people whose homes have been flooded.
Let's hope that tomorrow we'll all wake up to learn that, miraculously, the flooding has claimed no lives.
Unfortunately, the odds are too slim.
See you tomorrow!