February 18th, 2025 

Politics - First session between US and Russia completed

Ground Ops - Small Russian Gains in Kursk Salient

- Ukrainian pocket south-west of Kurakhove overrun - confirmed 

Weather

Cold weather continues, windchills worse.

Kharkiv

20 and clear, windchill 14. Partly to mostly cloudy for the next week. Daily highs will be in the mid 20s, lows will be in single digits, windchills 4-5 points lower. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

23 and partly cloudy, windchill 16. Partly to mostly cloudy for the next five days. Daily lows will be in the teens, daily highs at or just below freezing, windchills 6 - 8  degrees lower.  Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Kyiv

24 and partly cloudy, gusting to 20, windchill 13. Partly cloudy to cloudy all week, snow showers tomorrow. Daily lows will be in the teens all week, daily highs in the low 20s, windchills 8 - 10 degrees colder. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Politics and Diplomacy

A 4-hour meeting was held today in Saudi Arabia, led by SecState Rubio and ForMin Lavrov; the US team included: Mike Walz (National Security Advisor) and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff; the Russian team included: Presidential Aide Yuri Ushakov, and CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) Kirill Dmitriev. 

This first meeting was termed an “exploratory” meeting. Rubio said they are pursuing 4 issues:

1) restoring full diplomatic missions in Washington and Moscow

2) appointing a high-level team to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine

3) exploring "geopolitical and economic cooperation that could result from an end to the conflict in Ukraine”

4) ensuring U.S. and Russian delegations present in Riyadh remain engaged in discussions moving forward

Rubio called the talks "the first step of a long and difficult journey” and Lavrov called the meeting “very useful,” and stated that there was "a mutual desire" to find solutions.

The next immediate step is the appointment of the negotiation teams and their regular meetings.

According to “the Guardian,” Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration, Olha Stefanishyna, stated that Ukraine has not rejected the proposed rare earths agreement with the US; rather, the document is being discussed and 

"We expect that it will be signed.”

At the same time, “The Telegraph” commented that the draft agreement amounted to colonization, and imposed terms on Ukraine that are more severe than those imposed on Germany and Japan after WWII.

Per the Telegraph, "The terms of the contract that landed at Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office a week ago amount to the US economic colonisation (sic) of Ukraine, in legal perpetuity. It implies a burden of reparations that cannot possibly be achieved."

The US would receive 50% of all revenue, to include any new licenses, and the US would have right of first refusal for any new licenses. 

The Telegraph also noted that President Zelenskyy first proposed giving the US a direct stake in Ukraine’s rare earth deposits when he met with Trump in September 2024.

Ground Operations

KURSK SALIENT

Fighting was reported at multiple sites along the perimeter of the salient but there were no confirmed changes in the front line. Russian sources report that Russian forces have seized Sverdlikovo, the western most town in the salient, just inside Russia, but this has not been confirmed. 

NORTH OF KHARKIV

Russian bloggers report Russian gains east of Vovchansk, but these have not been confirmed.

NORTH OF THE DONETS RIVER

There are several reports that Russian forces made gains along the Oskil, north of Kupyansk (all the way to the border), but these are not confirmed. Positional data on Russian activity by the Ukrainian General Staff (UGS) suggests the Russians may have made some mall gains west of Terny.

Russian forces continued to attack along most of the line of contact, and there are multiple reports of Russian gains - most very small - but there were no confirmed gains to front line.

Fighting reported east and north-east of Borova but no change was noted on the location of Russian or Ukrainian forces. 

BAKHMUT

Fighting was reported in central Chasiv Yar and Russian reporting claimed gains in Chasiv Yar, and in Stupochky, and also noted that Russian forces were active just east of Bila Hora, but there were no confirmed changes to the front line.

In the Toretsk area, Russian forces continue to control the bulk of Toretsk and the small towns immediately to the north, but Ukrainian elements continue to hold on along the north edge of the town and in the north side of Krymske.

DONETSK

Russian forces continued to make gains along much of the perimeter of the salient, gaining ground at multiple points north-east, east, south-east and south-west of Pokrovsk. Of note, Russian forces appear to have regained complete control of Pishchane, just to the south-west of Pokrovsk, closing the small salient that Ukrainian forces had created last week.

Russian forces just south of Udachne remain less than 2 miles from the  Donetsk - Dnipropetrovsk oblast border.

West of Kurakhove Russian forces continue to push into Ulakly, appear to have most of Andriivka under their control, and there is fighting taking place on the south side of Konstiantynopil. Unconfirmed reports from Russian bloggers suggest that with the closing of the pocket south of Kurakhove that some Russian forces are being shifted north, to either the north perimeter of the Pokrovsk salient, or further north to the vicinity of Toretsk. 

Further south, Russian forces continue to push north-west from the general vicinity of Velyka Novosilke (VN), and appear to now control the town of Novosilke, about 6 miles due west of VN. Elsewhere, Russian forces continue to press into the fields to the west and north-west, moving tree line by tree line to control the spaces between the towns.

SOUTHERN UKRAINE 

There were UGS reports of Russian activities west of Orikhiv, to include activities near three separate towns along the T-0812 roadway west of Orikhiv, but there were no changes noted in the front line. Of note, there has been steady, incremental gains by Russian forces pushing north in the terrain north-west of Robotyne, and while no one has noted, it now appears that the Russians have pressed across the T0812 roadway about 6 miles west of Orikhiv, and whether they physically control the roadway, the roadway is now under direct fire from Russian artillery fro a distance of several miles.

There was no reported ground operations along the Dnepr River.

Air Operations

Russian forces launched 147 x Shahed drones and 3 x Kh-31P anti radar missiles into Ukrainian airspace during the night of the 16th and morning of the 17th. The UAF claimed it shot down 83 drones and that 59 drones were “lost” (brought down by EW). Power grid infrastructure hits were reported in Kharkiv, Kyiv, and Zaporizhia oblasts, and power outages were reported in Kyiv and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts.

Ukrainian government sources report that three fires were put out int he containments shelter at Chernobyl.

Economic Reporting

Feb22   Mar 7   Jun10-22 Jun8-23 Jun7 Dec9 Jan8 Feb7 Feb17 Feb18

Brent      94.71      119.50 120.90    75.58      80.06 72.63 76.69 74.89 75.06 75.51

WTI     92.10      123.80 119.50  71.29      75.81 68.85 73.94 71.17 71.13 71.53

NG       3.97       4.45     8.41      2.15      2.82 3.17 3.66 3.37 3.57 3.70

Wheat     8.52       12.94    10.71    6.17       6.40 5.59 5.37 5.86 5.38 5.97

Ruble     85         145.70  58.48     82.59      88.77 100.84 105.18 96.88 91.52 91.97

Hryvnia Pre Oct 2023 fixed at 36.4 41.55 42.33 41.46 41.55 41.64

Urals 56.56    67.61 66.19 71.76 68.32 67.71 67.79

ESPO 77 78.19 ??? 76.56 77.01

Sokol 65.32 72.79 70.92 71.17 71.72

Thoughts

The meetings are the obvious “big news item," and Lavrov did reiterate several points the Russians have brought up before: No NATO troops in Ukraine, no future Ukrainian membership in NATO, and the need for Ukrainian declared neutrality.

At the same time, European leadership is worried. Rubio did state that "there are other parties that have sanctions, the European Union is going to have to be at the table at some point, because they have sanctions as well that have been imposed.”

But, following a meeting in Paris of European leadership - that led to no agreements or proposals, Jana Puglierin, from the European Council on Foreign Relations, commented on the angst in European capitals: 

"February 2022 destroyed our faith in a collective security order with Russia and showed us the dark side of our fundamental dependence on Russia and China in critical areas...February 2025 shows us that the Americans no longer feel responsible for European security -- and that their interests are fundamentally different from ours.”

The simple fact is that Europe has 2 nuclear powers (the UK and France), 3 times as many people as Russia, and 10 times the GDP. After 80 years of leaning on the US, they should be able to defend themselves. The US isn’t going away, it is simply suggesting that European nations need to do more.

At the same time, it would appear that the obvious “deal” of generating US interest in Ukraine via Ukraine’s rare earth deposits might change the game at least a little, as it relates directly to US concerns with China and China’s dominance in certain rare earths and associated manufacturing.

v/r pete