Pro-invasion bloggers demand consequences after alleged HIMARS strike destroys Russian convoy more than 20 miles from Ukrainian border

Early on August 9, videos began appearing on Telegram showing a destroyed Russian military convoy, allegedly hit by the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF). One of the videos, filmed from a passing car, shows at least 14 trucks and one “Bukhanka” off-road UAZ van in ruins on both sides of the road. In the video, dozens of soldiers’ bodies are piled in the truck beds of stilling-running vehicles, but the footage isn’t enough to estimate the actual number of casualties. Meduza analyzes what the videos reveal and reviews reactions from the pro-invasion blogosphere, which has expressed exasperation with the Russian military’s decision-making throughout Ukraine’s incursion into the Kursk region.

The video was recorded on the E38 highway in the town of Oktyabrskoye, on the outskirts of the city of Rylsk. The location where the convoy was destroyed is about 30 kilometers (almost 19 miles) from the nearest known UAF positions east of the district center of Korenevo and 35 kilometers (almost 22 miles) from the Ukrainian border. At the time of this writing, Meduza cannot verify the convoy’s army unit, though “war correspondent” blogger Anastasia Kashevarova writes that the vehicles belong to the 44th Army Corps — a new formation of the Leningrad Military District, created in 2024 in the city of Luga, outside St. Petersburg.

The Telegram channel Voennyi Osvedomitel (Military Informer) reports that the convoy was struck by HIMARS rocket artillery before dawn on August 9. The channel later published photos purportedly showing HIMARS missile fragments allegedly found in the Kursk region (the photo shows an M101 cluster munition container) and stated that this evidence makes it possible “to declare with confidence” that the convoy was hit with these missiles, not loitering munitions.

According to the Telegram channel Mash, Russia’s Federal Security Service has already arrested the man who recorded one of the videos documenting the convoy strike’s aftermath. The suspect in custody is reportedly a 48-year-old Oktyabrskoye resident who allegedly shared the footage with a Ukrainian Telegram channel. Mash reports that the suspect confessed during the FSB’s interrogation that he acted “on assignment” when he filmed the scene and sent the footage to his Ukrainian contacts, supposedly in exchange for promises of money and citizenship in a NATO-member country.

Responding to the video showing the convoy’s destruction, pro-invasion Telegram channels have condemned the Russian military leadership's tactics.

The authors at Voennyi Osvedomitel wrote that the commanders responsible for the convoy’s movement near the border are guilty of “unbelievable stupidity.” The attack, said the channel, is “a consequence of the overall chaotic concentration of reserves in the breakthrough area, for which they were completely unprepared.” The Telegram channel Rybar, meanwhile, wrote that “the latest footage from the Kursk region shows that nearly three years of combat operations have still taught some people nothing.” Z-blogger Roman Alekhin was even less restrained, writing, “There should be executions for today’s convoys! Whoever ordered them to advance in columns in an area monitored by drones and thus within HIMARS range isn’t just an idiot but should also be sentenced according to wartime laws.”