24JUN

Russia fakes advance with AI footage

3 min read

16:16UTC

Russia infiltrated 100 to 250 fighters into Kostyantynivka, then circulated AI-generated flag-planting footage to fake a far larger seizure its defence ministry put at 103 buildings.

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Key takeaway

Russia is faking video of a Kostyantynivka advance its army could not actually make.

Russian forces infiltrated between 100 and 250 fighters into Kostyantynivka in Donetsk Oblast, then circulated artificial-intelligence-generated footage falsely depicting a far larger seizure, with the defence ministry claiming 103 buildings captured⁠¹. Kostyantynivka anchors Ukraine's fortified defensive belt in the Donbas, the line Russia has pushed at since 2024. An infiltration of a few hundred fighters is a probe, not a capture, and the fabricated footage was built to obscure that gap.

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a Washington research group, judged Russian momentum to be slowing, with neither army positioned for a breakthrough⁠². The AI footage matters because of what it replaces. When manoeuvre stalls, a defence ministry can still produce video of a flag going up, and that video does the work the army cannot.

The ground reality behind the fakery is a front that has been creeping backwards for weeks, with Moscow spending men to push a static line. The fabricated advance is the propaganda answer to that stalled map, and the loss-exchange figures showing how costly the stalemate has become sit in the day's front-line assessment.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Russia sent 100 to 250 soldiers into Kostyantynivka, a city in Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, and then distributed video made by artificial intelligence (AI) that falsely showed a much larger Russian capture. Russia's defence ministry claimed 103 buildings had been taken. In reality, the front line in Donetsk has barely moved. A senior Ukrainian drone commander reported that for every three Ukrainian soldiers killed each day, Russia loses 53, meaning Russia is suffering about 17 times as many deaths as Ukraine for the same amount of ground. Because Russia cannot show real advances, it is manufacturing them with AI-generated footage instead.

What could happen next?

Consequence
AI-generated footage of tactical operations sets a precedent that will be used by other actors in future conflicts; detection tools will need to develop faster than fabrication capabilities.
Risk
If the 53:3 loss exchange rate is sustained, Russia's available manpower pool for Donetsk operations decreases faster than it can be replaced at current recruitment rates.

Source Landscape

This story draws on mixed-leaning sources from Ukraine

Ukraine

Primary parallel: North Vietnam's information operations during the 1968 Tet Offensive provide the structural parallel: the Tet attacks largely failed tactically, but General Vo Nguyen Giap's information campaign converted the failure into a strategic shift in US domestic opinion that accelerated American withdrawal. AI-generated footage in 2026 applies the same mechanism: manufacturing visible progress when the territorial map offers none.

Counter-parallel: During the 1982 Falklands conflict, Argentina's military junta selectively released photographs of HMS Sheffield burning to claim the carrier HMS Hermes had been sunk, a deception British officials exposed within 72 hours using naval registry photographs. The staged stills were detectable because they depicted a named vessel journalists could independently locate; AI-generated flag-planting footage in an unnamed street allows no equivalent check.

Consensus view: ISW's own assessment of the Kostyantynivka situation identifies the AI-generated footage as a response to an information-operations deficit: Russia cannot produce real territorial gains to show its domestic audience or milblogger community, so it is manufacturing visual evidence of progress.

The 53:3 daily loss ratio reported by Robert Brovdi, if accurate over a sustained period, represents an attrition rate an attacker cannot sustain without either a breakthrough or a change of operational approach.

Counter-view: Pro-Kremlin military analysts, citing DeepState mapping divergences from ISW, argue that local infiltration operations like Kostyantynivka are genuine tactical probes rather than failed strategic advances, and that staging footage to support them is a proportionate information operation against an enemy that also uses information management. The 53:3 ratio is contested: Russian military bloggers claim the exchange rate is more favourable than Ukraine publishes.

Key tension: Whether the AI-fabricated footage is a symptom of strategic failure, as Western analysts assess, or a deliberate asymmetric information tool that serves Russian domestic cohesion regardless of battlefield reality.

Sources:Institute for the Study of War·Kyiv Independent

Mentions:Russia →Kostiantynivka →Institute for the Study of War →Vietnam →Kremlin →Moscow →Donetsk Oblast →DeepState →Russian forces →Donetsk →Donbas →Washington →Brovdi →Ukraine →Argentina →

First Reported In

Update #21 · Ukraine's drones reach Russia's petrol pumps

Institute for the Study of War· 24 Jun 2026

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Different Perspectives

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Péter Magyar

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Donald Tusk

Tusk said Warsaw would seek an explanation from Kyiv for the drone's route across Poland. He said Poland allows no operations over its territory without its explicit consent.

Mindaugas Sinkevičius

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AI-assisted, human-edited under the editorial responsibility of Bannermedia Ltd. Reviewed by Ed Woodcock on 24 June 2026. Editorial standards.