August 27th, 2025

Politics  - Trump: Economic War 

Combat Ops - No confirmed gains, Russian retain initiative

- Drone strikes on power grid

Weather

Kharkiv

71 and mostly cloudy, gusting over 20. Sunny through the weekend. Daily lows in the 50s, daily highs near 80. Winds variable, 5kts.

Melitopol

78 and sunny. Mostly sunny all week. Daily lows in the 60s, daily highs in the 80s. Winds easterly, 10-15kts.

Kyiv

63 and partly cloudy, gusting over 25. Mostly sunny weather through the weekend. Daily lows tomorrow in the low 50s, then lows near 60. Daily highs in the 60s through Wednesday, end of week warmer, highs in the low 80s by the weekend. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Politics 

President Trump was asked about his earlier comment of “severe consequences” of Putin did not agree to a peace proposal:

"It will not be a world war, but it will be an economic war, and an economic war is going to be bad and it's going to be bad for Russia, and I don't want that.”

A reporter then asked: Lavrov says Putin will not sign a deal with Zelenskyy because Russia views him as illegitimate. 

Trump answered: Doesn't matter what they say. It's all bullshit. It's posturing.

Ground Operations

SUMY AND KHARKIV OBLASTS

Fighting continues along most to the perimeter of the Russian incursion, and imagery confirmed Russian gains in the along the east edge of the incursion, south-east of the town of Loknia. Russian forces appear to control the H07 roadway from the border, south-west to just south-west of Yablunivka, and Russian forces are apparently pushing out across the farmland south and east of Loknia.

At the same time there are unconfirmed reports of Ukrainian forces pushing back into Bezsalivka (north-west of Sumy City) and they now control that small village.

Fighting continues north-east of Kharkiv City, but there were no confirmed gains, nor were there any changes in the line of contact along the border near Milove.

NORTH OF THE DONETS RIVER

Fighting continues along the entire line of contact, with imagery confirming only that there were small gains almost due east of Borova, just north of Novoyehorivka (south-east of Kopanky about 3 miles). This area is all open farmland, cut by several small streams, a few irregular patches of trees and dry creeks, and several north-south and east-west planted tree-lines. Movement here consists of fighting from one tree line to the next.

Reporting on Kupyansk reflect that Russian forces continue to slowly push into Sobolivka, and fighting continues on three sides of Kupaynsk, and recon probes continue to poke into the town. But how far they have pushed, and what parts of the various towns that are controlled by Russia is not clear.

BAKHMUT - TORETSK - POKROVSK

Fighting continues across this entire area but there were no confirmed changes to the line of contact. What is of note is that the Russians appear to retain the initiative in nearly all cases, Russian forces probing and attacking, Ukrainian forces responding, and in most cases holding. In the area north and north-east of Pokrovsk Ukrainian forces are attacking into the base of the salient, trying to “pinch off” the salient, Russian forces continue to try to move into the salient and hold the line. There were some Russian claims of gains around Pokrovsk but none of these could be confirmed. 

The fighting around the salient continues to confirm the initial assessments: small Russian elements found gaps in the Ukrainian lines - in some cases fairly sizable gaps in that the Ukrainians could not respond for several days, as a total of some 300 Russian infantry, in perhaps 10 - 12 platoon or smaller elements, pushed as far as 15 miles into Ukrainian held territory. The Ukrainian forces responded and are now trying to close it up.

SOUTHERN UKRAINE

There are no confirmed changes to the line of contact across the south, but there are reports that Russian forces continue to gain ground along the east bank of the Dnepr River and have pushed into the south edge of Prymorske.

Air Operations

During the night of August 26th-August 27th Russian forces launched 95 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down or defeated by EW, 74 Shahed drones, the target was energy infrastructure.

Damage from missile and drone strikes was reported in Chernihiv, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Poltava Sumy, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts; parts of Sumy city were left without electric power. There were no civilian casualties reported from the drone strikes.

RuAF tacair struck 4 Ukrainian towns.

There were civil casualties from artillery strikes in Kherson.

During the night of August 25th-August 26th Russian forces launched 59 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down or defeated by EW, 47 Shahed drones.

Damage from missile and drone strikes was reported in Chernihiv, Kharkiv and Sumy oblasts.

RuAF tacair struck 9 Ukrainian towns.

Economic Reporting

Feb22   May8 Jun9 July8 Aug8 Aug26 Aug27

Brent      94.71       61.93 66.80 70.44 66.90 67.33 67.12

WTI     92.10    59.00 64.89 68.65 64.29 63.31 63.17

NG       3.97          3.64 3.69 3.35 3.06 2.67 2.72

Wheat     8.52           5.34 5.49 5.49 5.18 5.32 5.27

Ruble     85          82.45 79.27 78.47 79.74 80.47 81.34

Hryvnia 28.6 41.55 41.55 41.80 41.39 41.36 41.30

Urals 91.66 54.13 60.84 64.07 63.17 64.22 63.56

ESPO 94.52 48.90 63.97 71.58 68.63 71.00 69.42

Sokol 99.31 57.39 61.51 64.38 62.57 65.22 63.96

Thoughts

Amid the various reports on casualties on both sides, two interesting reports surfaced in the last few days. The first is reporting - from the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office - that more than 200,000 soldiers are currently being charged with being AWOL, and more than 50,000 charged with desertion. 

Further, the rate of desertion is increasing and in the last several months has reportedly averaged more than 15,000 per month. Note that, per President Zelenskyy last month, Ukraine is bringing into the army 27,000 per month.

Meanwhile, per Ukrainian Intelligence Deputy Commander MGEN Skibitysky, the Russian army, with a goal of recruiting 40,000 per month, is currently recruiting “105 to 110%” of its goal.

The seriousness of these numbers is obvious: Ukrainian casualties (killed, wounded, missing, captured) exceeds 12,000 per month. Meanwhile, the Russian army, which is expanding in size, is bringing in more than enough people, and has apparently made plans to increase the number of troops inside Ukraine (currently between 600,000 and 700,000) by an additional 150,000.

v/r pete