CURRENTTIME — broadcast
20260807 040000 UTC
405 transcript segments
Google Cloud Speech-to-Text API (Chirp) + Gemini 2.5 Flash Non-Thinking
Data courtesy of The GDELT Project (https://www.gdeltproject.org/), from the Internet Archive TV News Archive.
Machine transcription. Treat it as a searchable index of what was broadcast, not a verbatim quotation record.

[00:00:25] the structure of the Ministry of Defense is being improved
[00:00:28] in connection with
[00:00:31] the needs and experience of the special
[00:00:34] military operation. Personnel rotation of personnel.
[00:00:38] Putin announced the unification of the rear services
[00:00:41] of the Ministry of Defense. He seeks to improve the
[00:00:44] leadership of the war, but at the same time not to promote any
[00:00:47] general who would look like his competitor. And about
[00:00:51] the change of the head of the UAV troops. The previous chief
[00:00:54] was selling plumbing. In parallel, in Russia
[00:00:57] assassination attempts continue on the heads of factories
[00:01:00] related to the production
[00:01:02] of drones,
[00:01:07] says Radio Liberty, shows the TV channel Present Time,
[00:01:11] on air is the program Face to the Event, hello, and today we will talk about
[00:01:14] reshuffles in the Russian army, personally announced by Vladimir
[00:01:17] Putin, for this in the public part of the meeting with the military, Putin
[00:01:21] spent as much as 7 minutes, judging by the video recording of the Kremlin's
[00:01:24] press service, there are some interesting moments in these very reshuffles, in
[00:01:28] particular the appearance.
[00:01:40] Large-scale reshuffles in the Ministry of Defense, the Russian president vaguely
[00:01:44] explained by the needs and experience of the special military operation,
[00:01:47] as the Kremlin calls the war with Ukraine. The last major reorganization, or rather
[00:01:51] a purge, was in this sector 2 years ago, when after the change of the Minister
[00:01:55] of Defense, the entire management team and many
[00:01:58] colleagues of the ex-head of the department, Shoigu, were arrested. The current
[00:02:01] reshuffles are not so radical and are rather connected with the not so
[00:02:05] rapid advance of the Russian army in eastern Ukraine. Official
[00:02:08] Russian media interpret the reshuffles as the deployment of combat
[00:02:12] generals to repair the rear. Colonel-General Valery
[00:02:15] Salatchuk, from the position of commander of the troops of the Central Military District,
[00:02:19] became Deputy Minister of Defense to organize logistical
[00:02:22] support for the troops. Deputy Minister Colonel-General Alexander
[00:02:26] Sanchik, previously responsible for material and technical support of the troops,
[00:02:30] now organizes orders for weapons, equipment, and
[00:02:33] technical support. Komsomolskaya Pravda describes it this way: everything
[00:02:36] related to weapons is now in one hand, all rear
[00:02:40] services are also in one fist. Another Deputy Minister
[00:02:43] of Defense, Alexey Krivoruchko, has been redirected to the development
[00:02:47] of promising weapons, military and special equipment.
[00:02:50] The story with especially promising equipment - drones. Received its
[00:02:54] continuation with the appointment of Colonel-General Denis Lyamin
[00:02:57] as head of the control of troops. Unmanned systems,
[00:03:01] Denis Igorevich, a new branch of the military is only
[00:03:04] being formed, catching up with more dynamic Ukraine
[00:03:08] in this area, where the path from the first presidential decrees to the real creation
[00:03:11] of a branch of the military took the entire year 2024, similar
[00:03:14] troops in Russia, the Minister of Defense presented as an idea in December
[00:03:18] 2024, and their creation was planned to be completed in the third
[00:03:22] quarter of 2025. I want to express hope that
[00:03:25] you, and so
[00:03:29] believes them.
[00:03:47] In place of those moved up the career ladder, Colonel-General Andrey
[00:03:51] Ivanaev has been appointed the new commander of the Central Military District,
[00:03:54] he previously commanded the troops of the Eastern District, in
[00:03:57] his place acting Colonel-General Pyotr
[00:04:01] Bolgarev, who was his chief of staff, has been appointed. Reshuffles in the military
[00:04:04] leadership, pro-government and pro-war Telegram channels comment with
[00:04:08] optimism. The failure of procurement and supply of drones to the front, which led to
[00:04:12] the actual cessation of the further advance of troops, predetermined
[00:04:15] the last personnel decisions of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. The famous
[00:04:19] phrase of Marshal Zhukov "The rear" is half the victory, which became the main
[00:04:23] motive for the new personnel decisions of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief.
[00:04:26] Putin's logic is extremely clear: who else but combat
[00:04:30] commanders knows better what the soldiers need right now.
[00:04:34] The details of what the soldiers need right now remained
[00:04:37] behind the scenes. Meetings with the Supreme Commander-in-Chief.
[00:04:41] The key difference of the current reshuffles, from those very de facto purges in the
[00:04:44] Ministry of Defense, two years ago, which our correspondent mentioned, according
[00:04:48] to analysts of the American Institute for the Study of War, is that
[00:04:52] these are precisely reshuffles among active commanders, and
[00:04:55] not the promotion of new ones, but who could change something, somehow inject
[00:04:59] fresh blood. so to speak, metaphorically, but the united
[00:05:02] rear service is interesting against the background, note the Institute for the Study of War,
[00:05:06] of ongoing successful air attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces. We have
[00:05:09] discussed many times in our broadcasts, our experts said that it is simply
[00:05:13] impossible to completely cover the whole of Russia with air defense systems, even if we take into account
[00:05:17] purely important for the military-industrial complex and for the Russian army
[00:05:19] production, organizations, factories, and so on, partly because of this,
[00:05:23] the Russian authorities are ready to give defense to those
[00:05:26] corporations who can afford it, while the mental task in
[00:05:30] the Kremlin, most likely, is not to overdo it with the appointment
[00:05:34] of self-confident bosses too high, too long,
[00:05:37] well, so that it does not turn into political competition for Putin,
[00:05:41] so says the analyst.
[00:06:12] It's clear, in general, he has, he must have complaints
[00:06:16] against them, but he must solve two tasks that
[00:06:19] are easily read: he seeks to improve, as it were,
[00:06:22] the leadership of the war, but at the same time not to nominate any
[00:06:26] general who would look like his competitor, that is, this
[00:06:29] is the most important task that he always set for
[00:06:32] himself, and even for some unpopular,
[00:06:35] for example, action, like the withdrawal of troops from Kherson, he appointed
[00:06:39] Surovikin, as we remember, immediately after that he removed him.
[00:07:13] First of all, this is the transfer of the commander of the East grouping to
[00:07:17] the Center grouping. The East was considered the most
[00:07:20] successful in terms of
[00:07:23] development, in terms of attacks, a grouping among all groupings
[00:07:26] of the Russian army, that is, they
[00:07:28] in
[00:07:31] the period from the twenty-third year captured the most Ukrainian
[00:07:35] territory in reality. So, therefore, against the background
[00:07:39] of the actual failure, one can directly say for the last... month
[00:07:42] of a complete halt to the Russian offensive in the main central
[00:07:46] section of the front, well, accordingly, as it were,
[00:07:50] the head of this central grouping is moved, and instead
[00:07:53] the commander of a successful grouping is appointed,
[00:07:56] whether it will help or not, is an open question, I would
[00:08:00] say probably not, because the problem of the center grouping
[00:08:03] is not that there
[00:08:07] the command is not decisive enough, but that
[00:08:10] they reached Slavyansk.
[00:08:21] At the same time, the Ukrainians managed to significantly
[00:08:25] reduce logistics during late
[00:08:28] July, early July, late June, early
[00:08:31] July, and the grouping was left without additional, so
[00:08:35] to speak, without additional supplies, but
[00:08:38] as it were, Putin knows best who he wants to see there as .
[00:09:43] stable, including, as you rightly said, due to the
[00:09:46] active use of drones, so I don't see
[00:09:50] Russia significantly advancing after any
[00:09:54] reappointments. Another question is that, in fact,
[00:09:57] the problem of Russia
[00:10:00] with increasing the number
[00:10:03] of drones used
[00:10:05] is very noticeable,
[00:10:09] that is, it is clear that the production and
[00:10:13] use of them in Ukraine is growing at a much higher rate than in
[00:10:17] Russia, it seems Belous after his appointment
[00:10:21] set the goal of at least achieving
[00:10:25] parity, or even surpassing Ukraine in terms of
[00:10:28] drones, and the first year of his, as it were, after his appointment,
[00:10:31] the situation changed in this regard, the last
[00:10:34] six months clearly experienced stagnation,
[00:10:38] and Russia again began to significantly lose
[00:10:41] the drone race, production, that is,
[00:10:45] the main problem is the scale of production of these
[00:10:48] drones, and there insiders, so to speak, Russian
[00:10:52] military, began to talk about the fact that...
[00:10:55] again the same situation with corruption schemes, with
[00:10:58] the supply of poor-quality drones to the troops, and so on and
[00:11:02] so forth, they blamed for this the former
[00:11:06] acting head of the unmanned troops, nicknamed
[00:11:09] Yuri Toilet, because he was involved in
[00:11:12] plumbing before he started doing it, by the way, we will get back to him
[00:11:16] and want to tell his story in more detail a little later, and yes, the reason
[00:11:20] for the dissatisfaction of the so-called z-bloggers with his candidacy and
[00:11:23] his position in these very...
[00:12:55] There are many fire groups, they apparently shoot down some
[00:12:58] of the drones, so as a result, the supply
[00:13:02] really recovered in the last, well, about a month, less
[00:13:06] than a month, in the last 3 weeks the supply of the rear, in general,
[00:13:09] resumed, despite some losses,
[00:13:13] but they are apparently not significant enough to stop all
[00:13:16] this movement, so here
[00:13:20] the situation depends on the actions of two sides, how consistent Ukraine will
[00:13:23] be, how much it will have
[00:13:26] enough of these medium-range
[00:13:30] drones to block highways,
[00:13:33] how much the Russian
[00:13:35] leadership will develop
[00:13:38] and, most importantly, be able to massively produce
[00:13:42] some anti-drone measures.
[00:13:45] Apparently, judging by the appointment
[00:13:48] of the commander of the unmanned systems forces,
[00:13:51] he will be a more experienced
[00:13:55] military leader than before. To what extent his managerial competencies will be enough to
[00:13:58] expand this bottleneck
[00:14:01] in the connection between drone manufacturers and
[00:14:04] drone consumers in the army, I don't know, only time
[00:14:08] will tell. And what do you think, by the way, about Putin's reluctance to promote one or another commander too
[00:14:11] much? Our interviewee Sergey Shelin sees exactly this kind of strategy, so to speak, in
[00:14:15] the Kremlin? Well, to be honest, I
[00:14:18] don't believe that a general capable of
[00:14:22] being a political competitor to Putin
[00:14:25] can emerge in Russia, in principle, the entire Soviet,
[00:14:28] late Soviet, post-Soviet
[00:14:31] political machine was aimed
[00:14:35] at preventing such generals from appearing,
[00:14:38] so here in
[00:14:41] these changes I see more of a desire
[00:14:45] to strengthen precisely the military potential
[00:14:48] to find, as it were, normal, promoted
[00:14:52] directly from the fields, experienced
[00:14:55] commanders, that is, this is rather a response to the appointment
[00:14:58] of Daropatov as commander-in-chief,
[00:15:01] rather than, as it were, to internal Russian political
[00:15:04] intrigues, well, separately, I have already spoiled it, today I want to talk about a specific unit of the Russian
[00:15:08] army with specific former and current military commanders with interesting
[00:15:11] call signs, or rather nicknames, even the call sign was a little different, here time
[00:15:15] and again Vladimir Putin or his military commanders make promises, sometimes
[00:15:19] specific deadlines, about the creation of such UAV troops, but from the Russian.
[00:15:22] from the speech of the Russian president before the generals it became clear: the new branch
[00:15:26] of troops, quote, is only being formed, although people
[00:15:29] are already actively being recruited there, well, at least such attempts are being made.
[00:15:33] The appointed head of drones, Lieutenant-General Denis Lyamin, formally
[00:15:36] replaced that very Yura
[00:15:40] Toilet, businessman Yuri Vaganov, whose appointment was never
[00:15:43] officially announced, but the community actively knew about all this,
[00:15:47] commented, and now even rejoices about it, how it
[00:15:50] happened, where such a nickname came from, we will tell everything in our
[00:15:53] story: Vladimir Putin's reshuffles in the army
[00:15:57] also affected the unmanned systems troops, from the speeches of the Russian
[00:16:00] president before the generals on August 5, it became clear: the new
[00:16:04] branch of troops, quote, is only being formed. The appointed head of
[00:16:08] drones, Lieutenant-General Denis Lyamin, formally replaced
[00:16:11] businessman Yuri Vaganov, whose appointment was
[00:16:15] never officially announced. Before the war, Yuri
[00:16:18] Vaganov, a businessman from Elektrostal, had no connection
[00:16:21] with the army and was selling plumbing, which is why in the so-called
[00:16:25] z-blogs he earned the nickname Toilet.
[00:16:28] The question is that he is a complete crook who, before the start
[00:16:32] of the SVO, traded plumbing, where did this
[00:16:34] nickname come from,
[00:16:37] after which he suddenly became, with the help of certain
[00:16:40] people, a monopolist in the supply, for example, of FPV to the Russian armed
[00:16:44] forces of the Russian Federation during the SVO. Vaganov's removal from office
[00:16:47] was met positively by the z-community. Vaganov
[00:16:50] the "Toilet" has been removed from office. 500
[00:16:53] billion. Plus the general technological lag
[00:16:56] behind the enemy by a year, plus the lives of soldiers. If the rear services
[00:17:00] need a deputy for toilets, then the ministry knows one
[00:17:04] genius whose call sign starts with G. In this matter, I
[00:17:08] do not intend to dispute his competence. Under Vaganov, the Ministry of Defense
[00:17:11] launched a large-scale campaign to recruit drone operators into the new
[00:17:15] troops. In early 2026, advertisements
[00:17:18] met Russians on social networks and billboards. The troops
[00:17:22] invited drone operators, students, IT specialists,
[00:17:25] electronics and radio engineering specialists. In March
[00:17:28] 2026, the publication Important Stories, citing documents from
[00:17:32] the Ministry of Defense, reported plans by the department to recruit almost
[00:17:36] 80,000 people into the drone troops by the end of the year, but the recruitment
[00:17:39] failed. After almost six months, in July, at a meeting of the board
[00:17:43] of the Ministry of Defense, it was reported that a much smaller number of
[00:17:46] specialists had been trained. Trained units are capable of independently performing
[00:17:49] tasks in separate operational tactical directions. In total, during
[00:17:53] the past period, about 800 specialists have been trained.
[00:17:57] According to the plan, among the 80 thousand people, there should have been,
[00:18:00] among others, students of civilian universities. In April, the publication Groza
[00:18:04] recorded at least 269 educational
[00:18:07] institutions where students were agitated to go and serve, allegedly in
[00:18:11] UAV troops. Students in various regions
[00:18:14] had their retake deadlines shortened, were threatened with academic problems, and
[00:18:17] manipulated with expulsion. The Russian
[00:18:20] campaign to recruit unmanned systems troops is already accompanied
[00:18:23] by several assassination attempts on public drone manufacturers. In late July, in
[00:18:27] Tula, they tried to shoot Andrey Cherizov, the head of
[00:18:30] the Russian Laboratory of Air Transport company. The company
[00:18:34] is engaged in the production of Okhotnik drones. Now doctors rate
[00:18:38] his condition as stable. The commander not only founded the company,
[00:18:42] but also personally designed the first strike drones, and then
[00:18:45] personally tested them on the front line. Thus, the small Tula
[00:18:48] company Okhotnik became one of the leading manufacturers of combat
[00:18:52] drones in Russia with a world name. On the evening of August
[00:18:55] 4, the general director of Ural-dron-zavod Vladimir Tkachuk survived
[00:18:59] an assassination attempt. Tkachuk's car was blown up by unknown persons
[00:19:02] near Yekaterinburg. His driver died, and he himself is in
[00:19:05] critical condition. Tkachuk
[00:19:08] is known for starting to produce Upyr drones, which are actively
[00:19:11] used by Russia on the front. His company's revenue for
[00:19:14] 2025 amounted to about 6 billion rubles.
[00:19:18] Meduza calls him the author of the Z-channel "War-Obsessed".
[00:19:21] Tkachuk launched it back in VK after the start of hostilities in
[00:19:25] southeastern Ukraine. We will
[00:19:28] continue the topic with military expert Nikolay Mitrokhin. Nikolay, well, in the
[00:19:31] community there are estimates of a year behind. How would you assess this lag in
[00:19:35] Russian drones?
[00:20:08] primarily, probably, due to the scale of production in Russia, they are
[00:20:11] smaller, but in terms of technical characteristics, they are similar, that is,
[00:20:15] today, for example, I watched how Russian drones on
[00:20:18] fiber optics in a video hunt
[00:20:21] people on the streets of Sumy, for example, well, to Sumy
[00:20:24] is still in a straight line to the front line, well, about 17
[00:20:27] km, given that the operators do not
[00:20:31] sit directly on the front line, this
[00:20:34] means that somewhere drones.
[00:20:38] with a fiber optic cable for 25-30 km,
[00:20:42] now, as it were, they are terrorizing
[00:20:46] a large regional center, where normal life is still going on, in general, or.
[00:21:20] priority in drones like lightning,
[00:21:22] these are, let's say, medium-range drones, mainly
[00:21:26] with various technical
[00:21:29] adaptations for different tasks, so
[00:21:32] it is clear that first
[00:21:35] of all the z-community talks about
[00:21:39] FPV drones and their shortage at
[00:21:42] the front, indeed, there are something like 10
[00:21:46] Ukrainian drones for one Russian drone,
[00:21:49] and... most likely Russia will try
[00:21:52] to solve the problem of massive
[00:21:56] increase in mass production of this type of drones, honestly,
[00:21:59] it's strange to me why Russia can't do this,
[00:22:03] perhaps the problems are in the supply of equipment, that is,
[00:22:06] sanctions are working and
[00:22:10] Russia simply does not have enough equipment
[00:22:12] for such production, maybe the problem is in corruption,
[00:22:16] also quite possible. This
[00:22:20] banquet, as it were, of the head
[00:22:22] of the Aerospace Forces showed that in general the generals are feasting, and
[00:22:26] if the generals are feasting, it means that money is not going to the right place, well, thank
[00:22:30] God, we will say, you mentioned these videos of attacks on civilians,
[00:22:34] I want to expand the context a little, there was information that, firstly,
[00:22:38] the Russian army calls it a safari on people, and
[00:22:41] well, and another such very bloody, very bloody episode of this war
[00:22:44] in itself, saying a lot in this context, but if
[00:22:48] we return to what is actually happening around
[00:22:52] UAV troops, what does the failure to recruit into these
[00:22:55] troops generally say, and maybe, according to your information, there are some data on
[00:22:58] the staff shortage in these very troops, it is clear that there was a campaign by human rights activists
[00:23:02] warning that a contract with the Ministry of Defense absolutely does not guarantee
[00:23:05] entry into these very troops, how effective do you think this was
[00:23:09] as such an anti-measure, so to speak, for recruitment into the Russian
[00:23:13] army? It is quite difficult to assess how
[00:23:16] such campaigns work at the mass level, well, in
[00:23:20] the village in the city of Revda Sverdlovsk region, how much they read, so
[00:23:23] to speak, emigrant human rights websites, I think not
[00:23:27] much, but a much greater effect
[00:23:31] was had by real cases disseminated
[00:23:34] including in the patriotic Russian press,
[00:23:37] when indeed experienced drone operators
[00:23:41] were transferred to assault troops, and they died there in the first
[00:23:45] attack, this case of "Uzik" which became simply
[00:23:48] a meme already, and the fact that such "uziks" did not bear
[00:23:52] any punishment, this is most likely what
[00:23:55] affects many much more strongly than any arguments
[00:23:59] of human rights activists, so
[00:24:02] therefore, since Russian society
[00:24:05] does not really believe the state
[00:24:09] and generals, therefore such a campaign, frankly speaking,
[00:24:12] overestimated in terms of the number of people,
[00:24:15] and, of course, did not succeed, so we need to pay attention
[00:24:19] to something else: we need to pay attention to really operating Russian
[00:24:22] drone units, in particular, "Rubicon" which
[00:24:26] has not been mentioned here today, that is, under the brand
[00:24:29] of specifically selected units, which are successful, effective
[00:24:33] and indeed guarantee their employees,
[00:24:36] recruited, well, relatively speaking, by the standards of this profession,
[00:24:40] safety,
[00:24:42] and you can recruit, I think,
[00:24:45] much more people, as it were, than we would like.
[00:24:48] Here, therefore,
[00:24:51] we will see what happens, but the appointment, conditionally speaking,
[00:24:55] of a tank general to recruit
[00:24:59] civilians for such an intelligent, relatively military
[00:25:02] specialty, is not, I think, the best choice,
[00:25:05] but we'll see how it goes. And separately,
[00:25:09] I want to emphasize what we mentioned in our story, two consecutive
[00:25:12] assassination attempts on civilians,
[00:25:16] but related. bosses,
[00:25:52] well, in principle, assassination attempts on the heads of the Russian
[00:25:55] military-industrial complex have been happening, well, at least since
[00:25:58] 2003, since the beginning, that is, directors of various
[00:26:01] scientific... ethnic centers have been killed several times during this period, and
[00:26:05] even more have survived assassination attempts in various forms, so this
[00:26:09] is nothing new, another question is that there was a certain
[00:26:13] period, let's say, from last
[00:26:16] September, rather until this
[00:26:19] spring, when the number of such assassination attempts
[00:26:23] decreased, possibly as a result of
[00:26:26] this, this was the result of the fact that
[00:26:29] after the killing of some major general...
[00:27:32] knows what he's doing, and the heads
[00:27:36] of such projects know their risks, well,
[00:27:39] if I understood correctly, you are talking about these two cases, in fact, about such
[00:27:43] outsourcing for the Ministry of Defense, where small private companies are engaged in
[00:27:46] all this, as you called them, DIY masters, who decided to make money from
[00:27:50] the war, and well, accordingly, there is less likelihood that the Russian authorities will even
[00:27:53] think about protecting them, since they, as if, should measure the risks, but
[00:27:57] it is not at all a fact that they understand what is being discussed in this situation, and
[00:28:01] therefore. Here the question is greed, because this
[00:28:04] last citizen, with such
[00:28:07] turnovers, could have provided himself with professional security at his own
[00:28:10] expense, if he did not do this, he is either a very stupid
[00:28:14] person, or very greedy, or both
[00:28:16] together,
[00:28:19] well, and accordingly, I also mentioned today, I will ask you very briefly, we are
[00:28:22] gradually running out of airtime, I mentioned that air defense is partially outsourced to
[00:28:26] private companies, and there was a specific law about it, that you can
[00:28:29] buy equipment, will it continue?
[00:29:03] Thank you, military expert Nikolay Mitrokhin was with us today, see you tomorrow, dear
[00:29:07] viewers, goodbye,
[00:29:26] an amazing story of Alexander Gabyshev, known as Sasha
[00:29:29] the shaman, who is walking from Yakutia to Moscow. To reject
[00:29:33] power, what does that mean, it means lightning and the wrath
[00:29:37] of God,
[00:29:39] one, two,
[00:29:41] three,
[00:29:44] I am not such a simple person, I am a heavenly person, a heavenly warrior,
[00:29:48] from now on, Putin is not your decree, live
[00:29:51] freely, this is the law, leave,
[00:29:54] please, what kind of cordoning off, and why is there a cordoning off
[00:29:57] here,
[00:30:00] come on, come on, come on!
[00:30:04] In Ukraine we always talked about unique places
[00:30:07] and unique people, but that was
[00:30:10] before, since February
[00:30:14] 2022 everything changed,
[00:30:17] war, we are showing a new
[00:30:20] history of Ukraine,
[00:30:23] about incredible strength of spirit, about struggle, despite
[00:30:26] everything,
[00:30:31] watch. A joint project of Radio Liberty and the Present Time TV channel,
[00:30:35] what is really happening in Ukraine.
[00:30:52] Ukraine is scaling up middle strikes, the Ukrainian army
[00:30:56] is actively hitting the operational rear of the Russian army, under attack.