Shooting at flying things in densely populated areas is generally a bad idea because when you miss, whatever ammunition you used falls on somebody on the ground. And if you hit, the debris falls on someone on the ground.
Even if you manage to hit it at that range there just isn’t enough kinetic power left to really do any damage.
For example here is a Finnish journalist being shot at 70m with birdshot. https://youtu.be/WJgzzrcSmNM?t=124 note that the shot did hit them but none managed to go trough the cardboard and normal civilian clothes were enough protection for other parts of the body.
Basically outside of drones that are trying to hit you (suicide fpv drones) birdshot is kinda useless as there isn't really any reason to fly them so close that they would be in effective range.
The spread will mean you likely won't hit what you are aiming at, but it is still dangerous.
No problem, you just say that Russians deliberately target civilians.
Why do you think that?
>almost requires us to also believe
That's easy. Russia deliberately targets civilians, but being totally inept, misses and hits different civilians.
>of which the evidence is scarce
Is it?
Have a look at this one, where Russia hit Ukrainian MLRSes in a night strike.[0] Western media reported that as inhuman and savage Russians destroying a shopping mall.[1] The mall indeed suffered but only because the Ukrainians parked MLRSes next to it. Ironically the Ukraine itself provided the evidence of that by distributing video where they talk about the mall but incidentally show destroyed MLRS (the other one got evaporated).[2]
[0] https://t.me/aleksandr_skif/3150
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/06/world/europe/russia-ukrai...
Re: Russia deliberately targets civilians, but being totally inept, misses and hits different civilians. -- Yep, absolutely, but this is unfalsifiable I guess. I mean, maybe they're targeting hostile aliens from space, but being inept, [...]
Re: Why do you think that? -- I extrapolate from Putin's allies really. Hamas specifically (and very vocally / proudly) targets civilians, Hezbollah targets civilians, Iran and Houthis routinely fire ballistic missiles at residential areas. (I'm only listing things I've actually witnessed, as a noncombatant.)
So intuitively they're all in the same bucket. I'll be happy to be completely wrong about Russia in this regard.
Here is the Ukraine targeting the same high-rise apartment building in Kazan with multiple drones: https://t.me/readovkanews/91042
Here is the Ukraine blowing a bridge in Russia exactly when a passenger train was passing under it leading to deaths of civilians including children: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/01/deaths-as-russ...
Here are a paramedic and an ambulance driver murdered by Ukrainian drone near Sudzha (Kurskaya oblast): https://t.me/readovkanews/85353
I could go on and on.
Which conclusions do you draw from that about the current Ukrainian regime or Ukrainian nationalists?
What? It's atrocities that are being committed right now by the Ukraine. Do they mean that "Ukraine deliberately targets Russian civilians"?
If you want to drag Russia vs Ukraine in, obviously Russia is hugely worse as the aggressor with their rapes and torture chambers and the like. I'm not Ukrainian or Russian and I don't think I've seen a clearer good vs evil war in my lifetime.
It's a function of what you call what the Ukraine does. If you use a report of an isolated episode to justify the claim that "Russia deliberately targets civilians" accompanying all Western reporting on Russian strikes, than you surely must accept the statement that "Ukrainian soldiers have swastika tatoos"[0]. Do you?
>with their rapes and torture chambers and the like
You forgot the infants raped with teaspoons and Viagra kits distributed to Russian soldiers, all according to Ukrainian sources and Western politicians and media. Having said that, I'm sure war crimes happen just like in any war.
>I don't think I've seen a clearer good vs evil war in my lifetime
That's exactly what Western media wants you to think. Russian state media wants Russians think the same.
[0] https://www.lemonde.fr/videos/video/2025/06/18/guerre-en-ukr...
Hamas, Hezbolla or Houthis are hardly Russian allies. Iran isn't fighting on the Russian side like North Korea did, but I guess you can call them an ally of sorts.
Here is a bit about Israel, which supports the Ukraine:
Two of the sources told the outlets that in the first few weeks of the war, the IDF allowed up to 15 or 20 civilian deaths for every low-ranking Hamas militant assassinated.
That number could increase to up to more than 100 civilians if the IDF were targeting a single senior Hamas official, the sources said.
"There was a completely permissive policy regarding the casualties of operations," one source said, according to the report. "A policy so permissive that in my opinion it had an element of revenge." [0]
[0] https://www.businessinsider.com/israelis-military-idf-civili...
I beg to differ.
* Russia sent missiles to Houthis just this year. Also assists with intelligence for attacks, at least according to https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2024/10/26/russia-provides-targ...
* The meeting where Putin says they have longstanding ties with Hamas: https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/04/17/putin-meets-with-r...
Iran, well, we agree: they're very much aligned politically, seem to have shared weapon programs (rumor has it, Iran's Shahed drone == RF's Geran' drone).
Having said all that, I now realize that I must've misused the word ally to mean political sympathizer, my bad. I meant "closely aligned" more than anything, like when the Russian media says "Anglo-saxons" to describe the political bloc.
Re: Assuming that's true, should we extrapolate that too? -- Honestly, maybe? I don't have an opinion, much less an educated one.
The article says it didn't happen, just that maybe some people disembarked.
>The meeting where Putin says they have longstanding ties with Hamas
That's not exactly what he said: "Russia’s stable, long-term relationships with the Palestinian people, their representatives and various organizations". If you deal with Palestine you have to deal with Hamas. Russia has stable, long-term relationship with Israel too.
>I meant "closely aligned" more than anything
To some degree, what degree is that is debatable. It's more like the enemy of my enemy (the US) thing if you ask my opinion.
>rumor has it, Iran's Shahed drone == RF's Geran' drone
Russia used to import Shahed drones, than organized their production domestically with Iranian help, improved the design, greatly scaled the production, created a decoy version and a jet-powered version.
>Honestly, maybe? I don't have an opinion, much less an educated one.
I'd rather not extrapolate in both cases)