Russia releases images of ‘British Challenger 2 tank destroyed by drone within its borders’

Russia claims to have destroyed a British Challenger 2 tank operating within its borders, while military bloggers trumpeted the efforts of Moscow forces to repel the Ukrainian invasion of Kursk.

Footage shared by the Troika Milblogging Telegram channel showed an FPV drone descending on British armor protruding from some bushes.

There was no immediate evidence of an explosion, but the Challenger 2 – operated by Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk region – was destroyed by Russia’s 155th Brigade Marines under the turret at “the main weak spot,” according to Russian reports.

“The very fact that it was transferred to the Kursk Oblast by the Ukrainian Armed Forces as a reserve indicates the enemy’s intention to hold the occupied lines in our region at all costs,” a Two Majors channel said Telegram, reposted by military channel Rybar.

“The enemy is throwing new reserves and NATO armored vehicles into battle and offering fierce resistance,” the military blog channel concluded.

Russia claims to have destroyed at least one other Challenger 2 tank delivered to Ukraine by Britain.

Footage shared by the Troika Milblogging Telegram channel showed an FPV drone descending on British armor protruding from some bushes

November 13, 2024: The Russian Army’s Solntsepyok multiple rocket launcher fires on Ukrainian positions in the border area of ​​the Kursk region, Russia

In this image, taken from a video released by the Russian Ministry of Defense on Thursday, November 7, 2024, Russian army soldiers fight with Ukrainian forces in the Sudzhansky district of Russia’s Kursk region

A photo made available by the State Emergency Service of Ukraine shows the site of a rocket attack on a five-story residential building in Kryvyi Rih, Ukraine, November 11, 2024

The doomed Challenger 2 tank is believed to be operated by the Ukrainian Army’s 82nd Airborne Assault Brigade.

The destruction of Kursk comes as Russia is amassing some 50,000 troops in preparation for a major operation to repel Ukrainian forces from the Kursk region, a presence seen as humiliating by Vladimir Putin.

The force is likely to consist of around 10,000 North Korean troops recruited by Putin.

Kiev’s forces remain in control of hundreds of square kilometers of the Kursk region, close to the Ukrainian border.

Elsewhere, Russian troops are said to have reached the outskirts of the Ukrainian city of Kupiansk, but both sides disputed the other’s claims about the battles that took place there.

Russian milbloggers claimed that armored units had entered the northeastern city and began capturing territory.

At night, enemy sources reported from the direction of Kupiansk about the entry of our troops into Kupiansk, which marks the beginning of the battle for the city. According to enemy estimates, two columns of Russian equipment advanced from the Liman Pervy area to Kupiansk.

“They managed to enter the city and land troops, who dispersed among the houses in the area around Svatovskaya Street.”

But the Ukrainian army said this morning that its forces were in full control of Kupiansk and that their troops had stopped a Russian advance on the railway junction.

“The alleged presence of Russian troops in the city of Kupiansk is not true,” the General Staff of the Ukrainian Army wrote on the Telegram messenger.

A Russian-installed official said earlier that Moscow’s forces gained a foothold on the outskirts of the city, more than two and a half years after Russia launched its full-scale invasion.

Kupiansk was captured by Moscow’s forces in the early days of their invasion in February 2022 and recaptured by Ukrainian forces months later in a swift counter-offensive.

Russian forces suffered an average of around 1,500 deaths and injuries per day in Ukraine in October, Britain’s chief of staff said.

Admiral Sir Tony Radakin told the BBC that the Russian people paid an “extraordinary price” for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion, saying October was the worst month for losses since the conflict began in February 2022.

A view from a drone showing a destroyed Russian armored vehicle in part of a forest where the hottest phase of the war is taking place on November 9, 2024. The forest is located about 8 kilometers southwest of Kreminna in Luhansk Oblast, Ukraine

A view shows a destroyed bridge, amid the Russian attack on Ukraine, in the city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, November 4, 2024

Admiral Sir Tony Radakin (pictured) told the BBC that the Russian people paid an “extraordinary price” for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion, saying October was the worst month for losses since the conflict began in February 2022.

According to Sir Tony, Putin’s forces (pictured) suffered an average of around 1,500 deaths and injuries per day in Ukraine in October

“Russia is about to suffer 700,000 deaths or injuries – the enormous pain and suffering that the Russian nation must bear because of Putin’s ambition,” he told the Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme.

He said that while Russia made gains and put pressure on Ukraine, the losses were “for small pieces of land.”

The cost of the war, which he estimated at more than 40 percent of government spending on defense and security, is also a “huge drain” on Russia.

With the election of newly-elected US President Donald Trump casting doubt on US support for Ukraine, Sir Tony said Western allies would support them “for as long as it takes”.

“That is the message that President Putin must absorb and the reassurance for President Zelensky,” he said.

Sir Tony wrote in The Sunday Times that the growing threat from authoritarian states, including Russia, North Korea and the Iran-backed Houthi movement in Yemen, is putting the international community “under enormous pressure”.

“This is a new era of competition and struggle that will last for decades and has the potential to disrupt our economy and our security more than anything Britain has seen in modern times,” he wrote.

This comes just two weeks after NATO’s top brass said Putin has lost more than 600,000 troops in Ukraine, forcing him to increasingly rely on foreign support for his invasion.

The military bloc’s secretary general, Mark Rutte, said that as a result of the heavy losses, North Korean troops have been sent to Russia’s Kursk region.