'Russkiy korabl', idi nakhuy!'

ZMIINYI Island, or Snake Island, is a scrap of land about 30 miles off the mouth of the Danube River in the Black Sea, and ordinarily serves little purpose but to physically mark Ukraine's southern border. In peaceful times, maybe 100 people live on the island; a small detachment of Ukrainian border guards and their families, along with a few scientific researchers.

In reports that sounded a little too sensational to be true at first but were eventually officially confirmed by the Ukrainian military and the office of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the island was the scene of a memorable last stand on Thursday. The border guards, just 13 men (their families and any others on the island having presumably been sent away to safety on the mainland), found themselves being hailed by a Russian frigate standing just offshore.