What is Intel Mapper
Intel Mapper is a live open-source-intelligence (OSINT) war map. It follows two theatres around the clock: the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the wider Middle East, from the Israel–Lebanon front and Syria to Yemen, the Red Sea and the Gulf. Every marker on the map is a single, dated event: a strike, a shoot-down, a ground assault, a naval incident, a capture, or a significant political statement, placed at the most precise location the sources support.
Events are gathered from monitored Telegram channels, X accounts, official military statements (for example the Ukrainian General Staff) and mapping projects such as DeepState and the Wikipedia conflict maps. Each report is read by a language model that extracts what happened, who did it, where and when, and then passed through a chain of deterministic checks: duplicate detection across channels, geocoding against our own settlement gazetteer and OpenStreetMap, country and region consistency guards, and frontline snapping for close-combat reports.
Every event carries a confidence score and a source count. One channel claiming a strike is not the same as three independent channels plus satellite-derived thermal detections, and the map shows that difference. Uncertain locations are drawn with an orange ring instead of a hard pin. Our methodology page explains the scoring in detail.
How to use the map
Switch theatres with the buttons at the top. The layer panel lets you toggle borders and control zones, event markers, the heat-map of activity, live military flights and US bases, and the Recent changes layers that hatch every area which changed hands in the last seven days (DeepState for Ukraine, Wikipedia-derived control maps for the Middle East). Click any marker for the full report, media and sources; click a control zone for its statistics. The time slider at the bottom replays borders and the previous 24 hours of events for any day since February 2026. A daily brief for each theatre is published every evening.
Coverage areas
Ukraine. The full contact line from Kharkiv to Kherson, deep-strike campaigns on Russian refineries, air bases and logistics, and Russian drone and missile waves against Ukrainian cities, with control changes taken from DeepState.
Middle East. The Israel–Lebanon front, Syria after Assad, the West Bank and Gaza, Iraq, and Iranian activity, including strikes on shipping and Gulf infrastructure.
Yemen and the Red Sea. The Houthi–Government war, Houthi attacks on shipping, coalition strikes, and control of the Bab al-Mandab approaches, using the Wikipedia control map and verified capture reports.
Today's brief — 2026-09-21
Ukraine strikes Russian refineries as Middle East escalates; U.S. tightens Iran sanctions
Ukraine executed a sustained campaign against Russian energy infrastructure and military-industrial targets. A Ukrainian drone strike on September 20 damaged both primary crude distillation units at Moscow's Gazprom Neft refinery, halting crude processing and igniting fires requiring weeks to repair. Additional strikes targeted the Slavneft-YANOS facility in Yaroslavl and Syzran Oil Refinery in Samara Oblast, damaging critical AVT-6 crude distillation units and reservoir infrastructure. Former President Trump cited these refineries as evidence of Russia's loss of diesel production capacity, claiming approximately 25,000 monthly Russian casualties. Ukraine's systematic targeting of Russian petrochemical and military-industrial capacity represents deliberate erosion of Moscow's war-sustaining infrastructure.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced comprehensive aviation sanctions against all Iranian airlines, effective September 23, with global entities prohibited from providing fuel, landing rights, or ticketing services. Simultaneously, the U.S. proposed a $5 billion PACT infrastructure fund for Gulf energy reconstruction, seeking matching contributions from eight regional partners to rebuild pipelines and refineries damaged during the Iran conflict. These measures signal coordinated U.S. pressure on Iranian economic capacity while signaling commitment to regional stabilization. U.S. UN Envoy Mike Waltz characterized the Iranian regime as at its weakest point since 1979, citing reduced funding to proxy forces Hezbollah and Hamas as evidence of financial strain.
Read the full Ukraine brief · Middle East brief · Archive
Latest reports
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