September 5th, 2025 NEXT SUMMARY TUESDAY, September 9th

Politics  - Coalition of the Willing meet in Paris

- 26 Nations taking part

Combat Ops - Marginal gains in Donetsk

- Russians pushing west in southern Ukraine 

 

Weather

Kharkiv

71 and sunny. Mostly sunny for the next five days. Daily lows in the mid 50s, daily highs in the upper 70s. Winds north-easterly, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

74 and sunny. Mostly sunny through Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday thunderstorms and rain showers. Daily lows around 60, daily highs in the low 80s. Winds easterly, 5-10kts.

Kyiv

71 and sunny. Mostly sunny weather through the middle of next week. Daily lows in the low 50s, daily highs in the mid 70s. Winds easterly, 5-10kts.

Politics 

The “Coalition of the Willing” met with President Zelenskyy in Paris yesterday to discuss security guarantees. The meeting was attended by, among others, President Macron of France and PM Starmer of the UK (the two lead the coalition), President Stubb of Finland, Chancellor Merz of Germany, PM Tusk of Poland, Ambassador Witkoff, EU Comm. President von der Leyen, and NATO SecGen Rutte.

Macron commented that 26 of the 36 countries have agreed to form a security force. Macron pointed out that the US has been involved in the talks and will participate in the security force. Others have expressed willingness to participate in the force but are waiting for more details, to include the extent of US participation, before they decide the level of their own participation.

EU Comm. President von der Leyen commented that Ukraine “must become a steel porcupine.”

The full list of countries that have agreed to provide forces of some sort has not been released. President Trump has noted several times that there will be no “US boots on the ground,” but it does appear that the US will have the lead in intelligence and in monitoring what will, in fact be a demilitarized zone.

Countries that have apparently voiced interest in supporting the future security force include Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Saudi Arabia.

Germany, Italy, and Spain, among others, have not agreed to provide forces, but have said they will provide other assistance, to include monetary support and training support.

President Putin commented that foreign troops in Ukraine are legitimate targets.

Ground Operations

SUMY AND KHARKLIV OBLASTS

Fighting continues in or near at least 4 different towns north of Sumy city; imagery confirms some Russian gains south of the town of Yablunivka, due north of Sumy city, and Russian forces probably gained ground outside of Varachyne.

Fighting continues north of Kharkiv, but there were no confirmed changes to the line of contact.

NORTH OF THE DONETS RIVER

Fighting continues inside Kupyansk; Ukrainian reporting is now including references to fighting inside the town, and noted some Ukrainian gains yesterday in pushing Russian forces back a block on the north side of the city. The line of contact now runs just inside the north and north-west edge of the city, at most a half-mile into the city. At the same time, Ukrainian relief workers, who are trying to evacuate the last civilians, report a good deal of Russian drone and light artillery fire, which is making their task more difficult. 

Elsewhere, fighting continued along the line of contact but there were no confirmed gains.

However, Russian and Ukrainian reporting both support the assessment that the Serebrianske forest - east of the Zherebets River - is now fully controlled by Russian forces. 

BAKHMUT - TORETSK - POKROVSK

Immediately south of the Donets River (and south of the Serebrianske forest, imagery confirmed that Ukrainian forces have pushed back into the town of Serebrianka, have pushed through the center of town, and appear to be pushing the Russians out of the east end of the town.

North of Chasiv Yar, the Russian MOD claims that Russian forces have taken the town of Markove, about 4 miles north of Chasiv Yar, and fighting is reported less than a mile east of the Viroliubivka.

West of Torestk Ukrainian forces have pushed back into Katerynivka; imagery confirms Ukrainian forces are in the west end of the town.

Further west of Toretsk, and north and north-east of Pokrovsk, fighting continues along virtually the entire perimeter of the Russian held terrain. Imagery confirmed Ukrainian gains to the west of the small village (less than 100 people) of Zatyshok, just south-east of Bilytske, at the base of the August salient. 

Further south, between the Solone and Vovcha Rivers, fighting continues but there were no confirmed charges in the line of contact.

SOUTHERN UKRAINE

South of the Vovcha River Russian forces continue to grind westward along the Oleksandrohrad - Vorone - Ternove line, and imagery confirmed Russian forces had pushed into Novoselivka (about 3 miles south-west of Oleksandrohrad) and probably control that town. Novoselivka is a town of perhaps several hundred people.

Fighting continues further west across southern Ukraine, but there were no confirmed changes to the front lines.

Air Operations

During the night of September 4th-September 5th, Russian forces launched 1 x Kh-59 cruise missile, 6 x S-300 ballistic missiles, and 157 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down or defeated by EW, 121 Shahed drones; the power grid was the key target in the strikes.

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

RuAF tacair struck 5 Ukrainian towns.

At least 3 civilians were killed and 5 wounded.

During the night of September 3rd-September 4th, Russian forces launched 112 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down or defeated by EW, 84 Shahed drones; the power grid was the key target in the strikes.

Damage from missile and drone strikes was reported in Chernihiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Kherson, Khmelnitsky, Odessa and Zaporizhzhia oblasts; at least 40,000 homes were left without power in Kharkiv Oblast. Unusually, a repair estimate was given, with a worst case of “at least a week” for return of power.

In addition, all of Sumy City and parts of Sumy Oblast had power outages in the past 24 hours due to strikes. It isn’t clear how many still have no power.

RuAF tacair struck 3 Ukrainian towns.

At least 13 civilians killed, and 5 wounded.

Economic Reporting

Feb22   May8 Jun9 July8 Aug8 Sep4 Sep5

Brent      94.71       61.93 66.80 70.44 66.90 66.80 65.34

WTI     92.10    59.00 64.89 68.65 64.29 63.23 61.76

NG       3.97          3.64 3.69 3.35 3.06 3.10 3.06

Wheat     8.52           5.34 5.49 5.49 5.18 5.17 5.22

Ruble     85          82.45 79.27 78.47 79.74 81.66 81.55

Hryvnia 28.6 41.55 41.55 41.80 41.39 41.32 41.21

Urals 91.66 54.13 60.84 64.07 63.17 60.88 61.66

ESPO 94.52 48.90 63.97 71.58 68.63 69.80 69.19

Sokol 99.31 57.39 61.51 64.38 62.57 63.39 63.08

Russia and China agreed to the construction of a 2nd natural gas pipeline from Russia (Siberia) to China. The current pipeline (Power of Siberia) moves 38 billion cubic meters per year to China and will be expanded to 44 billion cubic meters. Power of Siberia 2 (the “to be constructed” pipeline) will carry 50 billion cubic meters per year.

Financing and contract price for the gas has not been publicly released.

Russia will provide 2.5 million metric tons (18.75 million barrels) of oil China through Kazakhstan.

Thoughts

As for the war, the war grinds on. There are, as always, call for tougher sanctions. But, the truth is that, for a large country, trade sanctions don’t really work very well; even for medium sized countries. Consider Iran - the US has had trade sanctions against Iran for 46 years. Or Cuba - 67 years. Russia is a richer country than either of those two. Do we really think trade sanctions will work? Now China and Russia are building a major pipeline to improve sale of oil to China.

What to do? Everyone wants to do something. So, here’s a thought: sink a few Russian oil tankers. Middle of the night, well out to sea, a Mk-48 torpedo; 3 submarines, 3 tankers, same night, then disavow any knowledge. Deny, deny, deny.

Of course, that is an act of war. And Russia does have 5,000 nuclear weapons. So, fasten your seat belt.

My point is, there are all sorts of things we can do, but they may not give us the results we want. And to count on more sanctions against Russia and hope that will work is probably simplistic. Sanctions, even when they work, don’t work quickly. And again, look at Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Burma, etc., where sanctions have, arguably made the government dig in harder.

It may make things less pleasant, and economies weaken. But governments do not fall. And, except on very rare occasions, the people do not overthrow the regime.  

As I have mentioned before, there needs to be a significant “stick” (harsh sanctions) and a significant carrot (back into the international banking systems, a gradual opening of trade (oil, grains, fertilizers, etc.)) that gives Putin a reason to want to say “yes.” In a recent article, Zachary Paikin and George Beebe from the Quincy Institute, noted that 50 years ago the Helsinki Accords helped eased Cold War tensions. They weren’t perfect, they weren’t followed religiously, but there was enough compromise to see the US and USSR past some serious confrontations and it helped get us all to the end of the Cold War. But simply more sanctions almost assuredly will not work. There needs to be a big stick. But there will also need to be a big carrot.

 

v/r pete