Inside The “Yermak Blackout”: Fear, Silence, And The Destruction Of A Military Unit

A Ukrainian serviceman describes alleged blacklisting, fear, and institutional pressure after his unit’s operations and public statements during the war.

More about Yermak. Personal observations. I wrote this text back in February, but it was not published then.

Yuriy Kasyanov reveals.

“Mr. Yuriy, I can’t. I’m sorry. Otherwise, they will mobilize my son,” one fairly well-known host of a fairly well-known YouTube channel replied when I asked why she had stopped inviting me to broadcasts.

And it is a good answer. Usually, they simply stay silent. Journalists stay silent. Public figures stay silent. Well-known military experts stay silent. Generals stay silent. Ministers stay silent. Members of the Verkhovna Rada stay silent. Artists (crossed out) Office of the President staff stay silent.

Do you know what the ‘Yermak block’ is?.. Ohhh!.. It is a terrifying thing. The Yermak block — when you are effectively cut off — is when you are placed into an informational vacuum where you cannot reach anyone, cannot resolve anything, and everyone forgets about you except for the SBI investigator and the prosecutor, who will inevitably come for you when you are abandoned by everyone, forgotten, broken, and ready to obediently accept your fate.

While under the Yermak block, you feel like a voodoo doll with needles stuck into its small, defenseless body.

It is as if your mouth has been sealed with wax, your voice cannot be heard by anyone — neither Yermak himself, nor the president, nor MPs, nor ministers, nor the military command, nor even the local community police officer.

No one hears you, and everyone stays silent. Everyone is afraid.

You have been blocked, banned, marked with a black spot, and there is no force capable of helping you — even if the U.S. State Department itself were to plead your case.

Yermak never goes into negotiations. He is cold and ruthless. He always wins.

It would seem that Yermak has long since been dismissed, yet his blocks work as they always have. No one has gotten rid of the voodoo dolls.

And if, for some reason, Andriy Borysovych took a dislike to you, then nothing and no one will ever save you, because even a dismissed Yermak is worth two Montgomerys.

I first encountered the Yermak blackout back in September 2024, when I carelessly gave a technical interview about ‘missile-drones.’ Who even remembers now what those ‘missile-drones’ were?.. Where are they now?..

Back then, I was hit unbelievably hard for allegedly contradicting the president’s words. I was put under a ban — urgent issues concerning our unit were blocked, and its development was brought to a halt. Deineko personally blocked my phone number and any possibility of appeal.

Do you understand?.. Simply because journalists wrote a clickbait headline for my interview, they wanted to disband our unit for the first time. What does that have to do with combat effectiveness, with the war?.. Nothing at all. In the kingdom of voodoo dolls, there is no Ukraine.

The second time needles were stuck into me was after our unit’s successful strike on Moscow on March 14, 2025. Had we known we were not allowed to do it, we would not have done it. But we were carrying out an order!

Yet everyone was punished with the needles — the unit was put under a ban, forbidden to fly or fight, and eventually dissolved, because the magic works flawlessly when it is backed by the full power of the state apparatus, the military machine, and law enforcement.

And for half a year now, the people pierced with those needles have been kept in the torture chambers of the State Border Guard Service. Drone designers, engineers, talented analysts, experienced operators — all turned into voiceless and helpless puppets in Karabas-Barabas’s theater.

The curse works from every direction. Many good people, commanders, tried to help us, to take the unit under their command, to give us the opportunity to fight. But they, too, received needles under their fingernails as a warning.

Journalists — even from supposedly opposition outlets — were forbidden from speaking to me. Every person has weak spots, especially during a major war and mobilization.

I tried many times to lift the curse. I offered Andriy Borysovych a chance to reach an agreement, even publicly. Even now — I still have his phone number.

But it seems that no one knows the spell that could help us pull out the needles. Or no one wants to speak it, to give the order to restore the unit — and justice.

In the kingdom of voodoo dolls, there is no war with Russia. There, the fight is against those who are too brave, too smart, and too successful.

For some reason, they decided that voodoo dolls are worth nothing. But once before, the cursed dolls already won on Karabas-Barabas’s Maidan.

I was there. I remember it.

EMPR