February 10th, 2025 

Ground Ops - Kursk Offensive stalls

- Hard fighting just west of Pokrovsk

Politics  - Trump has spoken to Putin and Zelenskyy 

Weather

Cold, windchills worse.

Kharkiv

20 and partly cloudy, windchill 14. Partly to mostly cloudy all week, snow showers on the weekend. Daily highs in the low to mid 20s, daily lows in the mid teens, windchills single digits to low teens. Winds easterly, 5kts.

Melitopol

23 and partly cloudy, windchill 15. Mostly sunny through Friday, rain-snow mix on the weekend. Daily highs for the next week will be at or just below freezing, daily lows in the low 20s to teens. Windchills single digits to teens. Winds easterly, 5-10kts.

Kyiv

10 and mostly cloudy, windchill 10. Partly cloudy to cloudy all week, snow showers Friday night. Daily highs in the mid 20s, daily lows in the low 20s or teens; windchills 6 or 7 degrees colder. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Ground Operations 

Kursk Salient

Imagery confirmed that Ukraine elements did advance along the road south-east out of Sudzha into Cherkasskaya Konopelka and Fanaseyevka and one or more scouting elements may have made it to Ulanok, but forward progress appears to have been stopped. It may have been an attempt by the Ukrainians to flank the Russian Marine Regiment near Makhnovka, but the regiment appears to have remained engaged to the west, and the Ukrainian forces have been engaged by other Russian elements and stopped.

Russian bloggers claim that at least 1 x M1 tank was destroyed in this assault.

North of Kharkiv

Fighting continues in both small salients, and imagery confirmed Ukrainian forces made gains inside the aggregate plant in Vovchansk. Against, this is one of those ugly fights that we have seen multiple times over the past 3 years, in-close fighting inside a heavy industry facility - steel mill, mine, factory - that see-saws back and forth fighting at times literally for one room at a time, often fighting for the same room many times. 

North of the Donets River

Russian forces claimed gains north of Kupyansk, specifically west and north-west of Zapadne, and there is some indication that they may have made marginal gains to the west and north-west in the direction of the small town of Kutkivka, but this has not been confirmed.

  Russian forces continue to probe in the area east of Borova, but there were no confirmed gains over the past several days.

Russian sources claimed small gains west of Terny (west of the Zherebets River) - distances of several hundred meters or one tree-line - but these have not been confirmed.

 Bakhmut

Fighting continues north, west and south of Bakhmut, but while there were Russian claims of some gains just to the north of Chasiv Yar, there were no confirmed changes to the front lines in this area.

Video released last Friday showed Russian forces apparently in control of a well-destroyed Toretsk.

Russian forces continued advancing up central Leonidivka, and some blogs suggest they now control most of that town.

Donetsk

Overall, the slow Russian crawl forward continues. Russian forces had gains at multiple points around Pokrovsk, pressing in from the south, pushing forward from several spots, east of Pokrovsk, and making small gains to the west of Pokrovsk, both further west and to the north.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian forces attacked from the east into Kotlyne along and shut south of the T0406 roadway, a thin salient perhaps a half mile long. The attack was stopped but there is now reportedly a nasty fight taking place as the Ukrainians try to push forward and circle the Russian forces north of the road, and the Russian forces try to cut off the salient at its eastern end and trap the Ukrainians.

To the immediate south-west of Pokrovsk there appears to be some hard fighting taking place as Ukrainian forces have pushed to Mine No. 3 in eastern Pishchane.

South-west of Kurakhove Russian forces may have cleared out the last of the Ukrainian forces in Dachne but have not pushed further westward through that town. Reporting also suggests that the town of Zelenivka, on the west side of the pocket, is still contested terrain and Ukrainian forces are holding their ground.

West of Kurakhove Russian forces now appear to control most of the eastern half of Andriivka, but have not pushed into Ulakly, immediately south of Andriivka. Ulakly sits in the middle of the gap that is the exit from the pocket. Ukrainian forces need to keep open this gap; Russian forces need to close it and cut off Ukrainian forces in the pocket. 

Russian forces have pushed north and west of Novyi Komar, mainly into otherwise empty terrain.

Southern Ukraine

Russian probes continue, and both forces are conducting strikes with FPV drones and artillery, but there were no changes it the front lines over the weekend. 

Air Operations

Russian forces launched 83 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian airspace last night and this morning; the UAF claimed it shot down 61 drones and 22 drones were lost (defeated by EW). A number of Shahed drones struck Kyiv this morning resulting in a fire at an apartment complex, but there were no reported injuries.

The Russians conducted another large scale strike on the night of the 8th, launching 151 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian airspace. The UAF claimed it shot down 70 drones and that 74 drones were lost (defeated by EW). Drone strikes were reported Kyiv,  and in Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, Sumy, Volyn, and Zhytomyr oblasts.

Also of note, Ukrainian General Staff reporting notes more instances of Russian tacair striking targets 10 miles or more behind the lines, hitting the next echelon of targets, as it were...

President Zelenskyy, in his nightly broadcast, noted that between February 2nd and February 9th Russian forces launched 10 x missiles, 750 x Shahed drones, and more than 1,260 x glide bombs against Ukrainian targets.

There is increased reporting by Ukrainian forces of Russian use of wire-guided (fiber optics) FPV drones, negating Ukrainian gains in electronic warfare (EW).

Russian forces are also reportedly operating intelligence drones from ships in the Baltic, collecting on NATO activates and collecting on Ukrainian units training at NATO bases.

Politics

As has been well documented, there has been a good deal of work behind the scenes on negotiations. It now appears that indeed President Trump and President Putin have had at least one conversation, as was mentioned by President Trump in an interview on Friday. 

Trump did not give specifics as to what was discussed.

When asked, Kremlin spokesman Peskov said only: “I can neither confirm nor deny it.”

President Zelenskyy told Reuters that he hopes to make a deal with President Trump to end the war.

Economic Reporting

Feb22   Mar 7   Jun10-22 Jun8-23 Jun7 Dec9 Jan8 Feb7 Feb10

Brent      94.71      119.50 120.90    75.58      80.06 72.63 76.69 74.89 75.47

WTI     92.10      123.80 119.50  71.29      75.81 68.85 73.94 71.17 71.86

NG       3.97       4.45     8.41      2.15      2.82 3.17 3.66 3.37 3.37

Wheat     8.52       12.94    10.71    6.17       6.40 5.59 5.37 5.86 5.83

Ruble     85         145.70  58.48     82.59      88.77 100.84 105.18 96.88 97.48

Hryvnia Pre Oct 2023 fixed at 36.4 41.55 42.33 41.46 41.61

Urals 56.56    67.61 66.19 71.76 68.32 68.15

ESPO 77 78.19 ??? 76.97

Sokol 65.32 72.79 70.92 71.43

Thoughts

On the ground, the war remains quite brutal, abetted now by the cold weather. Individual engagements continue to be hard-fought and when each side commits forces, expensive. Anecdotal reporting suggests that the 2 Ukrainian battalions that conducted the attack in the Kursk salient have been chewed up, though, of course the casualty counts are certainly inflated. 

But both sides still are fighting with great ferocity after 3 long years. Yet, while a good deal is made of Russia’s economic woes, wars are won or lost on will, and Russia’s will does not seem to be fading. Nor for that matter, does Ukraine’s.

Though, the report, unsubstantiated at this point, that 9 of 10 newspapers in Ukraine were being provided funding by USAID may call into question the accuracy of the reporting on support for the war inside Ukraine. 

The pictures released on Friday of Toretsk show another badly smashed town. I include two photos: one of Toretsk from a few days ago, and one of Chasiv Yar from the 29th of January, to give you some idea of the level of destruction.

Torestk

Chasiv Yar

At the same time, Trump has now spoken to Both Putin and Zelenskyy. Presumably, the main point was to grease the skids for Kellogg to actually start talking to each. 

v/r pete