By now, everyone outside of Russian government officials has acknowledged that Russia has had a direct hand in guiding and participating in the Ukrainian Conflict, from 2014 until the current day. However, it is often difficult to gain reliable insight into the exact magnitude and nature of this involvement— how many Russian soldiers are sent into Ukraine? what military equipment is being sent? which brigades and military units are involved, and what happens with the soldiers and equipment after their time in Ukraine? The answers to these questions differ wildly, depending on who is answering, and when. In March 2015, U.S. Army Europe Commander Ben Hodges said that there were roughly “12,000 Russian troops” in eastern Ukraine. Dr. Igor Sutyagin of the Royal United Services Institute provided various estimates, including approximately 3,500–6,500 Russian servicemen in August 2014, and reaching as high as 10,000 in December 2014. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has changed his estimate quite a few times, including a count of 15,000 Russian servicemen in August 2014, to “200,000 Russian soldiers” and pieces of military equipment, and then back to “more than 40,000” in August 2015. And finally, the Russian government has not shifted from its estimate of how many Russian servicemen have fought in the Donbas: 0.

The online avatar of Askai

The individual who has made the most well-rounded and convincing case regarding Russian involvement in Ukraine is a name you may not have heard —Askai, an independent and anonymous investigator. His real name is unknown, and little is known about his identity other than that he is a Ukrainian man. Online, he goes by the name Askai on his Twitter account @Askai707. Since November 2014, Askai has published his meticulous, almost obsessively detailed research on his LiveJournal Sled-Vzyat, which can be loosely translated as “Picked-up trail,” in the sense of a hunting dog following the trail of a fox or police investigators picking up a lead on a criminal. Rather than taking a wide, inexact view of the conflict, Askai instead focuses on individual, verifiable cases that reveal broader trends — without excessive rhetorical posturing that over or underestimates Russian involvement in the war. In particular, he has identified a handful of Russian brigades that have directly participated in the conflict:

— 200th Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade (military unit 08275, Pechenga)

— 61st Separate Naval Infantry Brigade (military unit 38643, Sputnik)

— 5th Separate Tank Brigade (military unit 46108, Ulan-Ude)

— 6th Separate Tank Brigade (military unit 54096, Mulino)

— 136th Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade (military unit 63354, Buynaksk)

— 18th Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade (military unit 27777, Khankala/Stantsiya Kalinovskaya)

— 8th Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade (military unit 16544, Borzoy)

— 17th Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade (military unit 65384, Shali)

— 23rd Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade (military unit 65349, Samara)

— 11th Separate Engineering Brigade (military unit 45767, Kamensk-Shakhtinsky)

One article is not nearly enough to summarize all of Askai’s major findings, but we at DFRLab will attempt to outline the general trends and some significant findings from Askai’s research. Cutting through the political rhetoric, Askai’s evidence-based research is invaluable for understanding what Russia did and did not do in Ukraine, and what signs we should continue to look for in anticipating future violations of the Minsk accords.