Meet the radio-obsessed civilian shaping Ukraine's drone defense

Despite this reputation among rank-and-file service members--and maybe because of it--Flash has also become a source of some controversy among the upper echelons of Ukraine's military, he tells me. The Armed Forces of Ukraine declined multiple requests for comment, but Flash and his colleagues claim that some high-ranking officials perceive him as a security threat, worrying that he shares too much information and doesn't do enough to secure sensitive intel. As a result, some refuse to support or engage with him. Others, Flash says, pretend he doesn't exist. Either way, he believes they are simply insecure about the value of their own contributions--"because everybody knows that Serhii Flash is not sitting in Kyiv like a colonel in the Ministry of Defense," he tells me in the abrasive fashion that I've come to learn is typical of his character.