January 12th, 2026 Next Summary January 14th

Politics - Proposed extension of Martial law (18th)

- Power Grid damages and power outages

- President Trump hopeful

Combat Ops - Russian gains in Pokrovsk and Hulyaipole

- Ukrainian drones strike oil platforms in Caspian Sea

Weather

The very cold weather has arrived. While there are reports of skirmishes along most of the line, the extreme cold, and in some cases more extreme wind chill may result in some drop in activity.

Kharkiv

13 and cloudy. Mostly cloudy for the next week, snow showers on Thursday. Very cold, daily high temperatures will remain in the mid teens, daily lows in single digits, but light wind so no appreciable wind chill for the next 3 days. Winds variable, 5kts.

Melitopol

11 and cloudy. Partly to mostly cloudy for the next week, snow on Thursday. Cold, daily highs in the upper 20s, daily lows in the teens. Light wind so little wind chill for the next 4 days. Winds variable, 5kts.

Kyiv

12 and cloudy. Cloudy for the next week, very cold. Daily high temperatures will not get above the low teens, daily lows near zero, wind chill consistently 10 degrees below the actual temperature. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Politics

President Zelenskyy submitted a proposal to the Verkhovna Rada for the extension of martial law and general mobilization for a further 90 days, to begin February 3rd. This will mark the 18th extension of martial law and mobilization.

Due to damage to the power grid, emergency power outages have begun in all districts of Kyiv. As of this morning they had not published a schedule for when the outages will be lifted. Morning power outages were also noted in Chernihiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Odessa, Sumy, Zakarpattia and Zhytomyr oblasts.

President Trump remains hopeful that there can be a peace agreement of some sort. In an interview over the weekend he was optimistic after talking to President Putin.

"I feel strongly they wouldn’t reinvade, or I wouldn’t agree to it. I feel strongly that they would not reinvade…I think now they both want to make a deal, but we’ll find out.”

Finally, Dymtro Kuleba, Ukraine’s last Foreign Minister (March 2020 - September 2024), commented on whether there was a chance to end the war this year:

"Ending the war, no. A ceasefire, yes."

"You see, wars stop when everyone has a motivation. It can be positive or negative.

“Positive motivation is: I have achieved what I wanted; that is enough for now, let's stop. Negative motivation is pressure from partners and domestic difficulties; I need to take a break and regroup or relieve pressure from a partner forcing me to do it.

The ceasefire between Israel and HAMAS is precisely a combination of both motivations.

“We do not have that combination at the moment. Russia is confident it can achieve its goals by military means. Ukraine is confident it can hold out. Trump, paradoxical as it may sound, is running between Putin and Zelenskyy, trying to create negative and positive motivation for them, but it still does not work.

“Why? Because each side has compensating resources. As I said, for Russia it is China. For us it is Europe. That is why, as long as Europe and Ukraine stand together, Trump cannot break them."

"If, for some reason, nothing works out now, the next attempt will not start 100 metres from the finish but from one metre, though that is the hardest metre.

“But I believe there will be no ceasefire deal with the Russians by the end of winter for one simple reason: why would they smash up the energy sector and the economy going into winter only to stop suddenly? Clearly, that is not their strategy."

"The next burst of the negotiating process will be at the end of February.”

Ground Operations

SUMY AND KHARKIV

Fighting continues north of Sumy City as well as north of Kharkiv, but there were no confirmed changes to the front lines over the last several days.

NORTH OF THE DONETS RIVER

Fighting continues east of Kupyansk and Russian forces have resumed conducting recon probes into Kupyansk itself and the surrounding towns, but there were no changes to the front lines over the last few days.

Of interest is that a Ukrainian forces spokesman estimated that between 25 and 90 Russian troops remain in Kupyansk. What is of note is that there have been less than 100 Russian troops left in the city since the middle of December (possibly earlier), and they are still holding on. There is at least one Ukrainian brigade committed to the city.  

Fighting continues along the front lines dow to the Donets River but with only one confirmed change, as Russian forces gained ground just west of Ridokub, along the Nitrius River.

BAKHMUT - TORETSK - POKROVSK 

North of Bakhmut, in the Russian forces continue to attack to the west and south-west from the general area west of Siversk, but there were no confirmed changes in the front lines, though there were several claims of Russian gains in the area south-west of Dibrova. Russian probes into Lyman also continue.

South-west of Chasiv Yar - North-west of Toretsk, Russian recon elements continue to probe into Kostiantinivka, and imagery confirmed small Russian troop elements active inside the eastern half of Kostiantinivka. 

West of Toretsk, north of Pokrovsk, fighting continued but there were no changes to the front lines.

Further to the southwest, in Pokrovsk and the Myrnohrad area, Russian forces have made small, but confirmed gains, 

Inside Pokrovsk, imagery confirms that Ukrainian forces have been pushed out of the eastern half of the city. In the western half Ukrainian forces appear to hold small positions on the west side of the city and north-west edge, and there are probably several small pockets of Ukrainian troops isolated inside the city. There are no confirmed charges in Myrnohrad, but with Russian forces taking control of the eastern half of Pokrovsk the situation in Myrnohrad will become more difficult.

Further to the southwest there were no confirmed changes to the front line southward to the Vovcha River. Russian forces continue to attack along the Solona River toward Novopavlivka but there are no confirmed changes.

SOUTHERN UKRAINE

South of the Vovcha River, to Hulyaipole, Russian forces remain on the attack, and appear to have taken the area around the small town of Pryluky (on the Haichur River), 5-6 miles north-west of Hulyaipole, and Russian sources claim they now control the town as well.

Inside Hulyaipole Ukrainian sources report Russian forces made gains in central and western Hulyaipole as well.

Further to the west, along the Dnepr River, Ukrainian sources report Russian forces pushed north along the coast out of the Kamyanske area and have reached the mouth of the Kinska River, near Prymorske.

Air and Maritime Operations 

During the night of January 11th-January 12th, Russian forces launched at least 156 x drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down, or defeated with EW, 135 drones. drones.

Damage was reported in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, and Odessa oblasts. Kryvyi Rih reported being stuck by at least two ballistic missiles. Energy infrastructure was again the primary target, and damage from earlier strikes is still being repaired across the country. As of this morning more than 1,000 residential buildings in Kyiv are without power.

Civilian casualties include at least 4 killed and 10 civilians injured.

RuAF tacair struck targets in 6 towns.

During the period from January 8th to January 11th, Russian forces launched 1 x Oreshnik IRBM (possibly with hypersonic glide vehicle(s)), 14 x Iskander ballistic missiles, 22 x Kalibr cruise missiles, and 614 x drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down or defeated 3 Iskander ballistic missiles, 10 cruise missiles, and 511 drones. Targets were struck across much of the center and east sections of the country. The targets were predominantly power grid related targets. 

The Oreshnik missile struck is now assessed to have struck an aircraft manufacturing related facility near Lviv. (For more on the Oreshnik, please look at my notes from yesterday).

There is no overall casualty count.

For the period January 4th - January 11th Russian strike totals (per President Zelenskyy’s office) included almost 1,100 x strike drones, 890 x glide bombs and more than 50 x ballistic and cruise missiles. Targets content o be predominantly power grid related gear and facilities.

Russia has begun use of a new drone - Geran 5 (Geran is the name of the Russian built Shahed drones. The new drone is the 5th variant, has a 1000KM (550nm) Orangeman carry a 90KG (200lb) warhead, and can also reportedly be equipped with an R-73 Vympel (NATO AA-11) air-to-air missile.

On January 10th Ukrainian forces again struck at least 3 drilling platforms in the Caspian Sea (V Filanovsky, Yuri Korchagin and Valery Grayfer platforms); damages are still being assessed.

Economic Reporting

Feb22   Sep9 Oct8 Nov7 Dec8 Jan8 Jan9

Brent      94.71    67.03 66.18 63.86 62.94 61.26 63.04

WTI     92.10    63.26 62.48 59.94 59.26 57.10 58.75

NG       3.97         3.12 3.44 4.33 4.96 3.41 3.21

Wheat     8.52         5.22 5.06 5.32 5.38 5.22 5.24

Ruble     85          84.03 81.28 80.95 76.52 80.35 78.33

Hryvnia 28.6 41.23 41.48 41.89 42.15 43.10 43.26

Urals 91.66 60.12 61.15 56.56 54.92 50.40 53.62

ESPO 94.52 68.32 66.74 65.18 61.95 52.28 55.49

Sokol 99.31 62.97 61.91 60.71 60.62 55.57 58.04

Thoughts

The cold weather and the strikes on the power grid are a nasty combination and the Ukrainian power grid is increasingly fragile, with smaller strikes causing longer blackouts. There is no easy way out of that problem, and the living conditions of the people in the cities is likely to get substantially worse if the cold persists.

The current forecast is that the temperature in the Kyiv area will not rise above 14 degrees (-10C) at any time for the next 10 days, and nighttime temperatures will routinely fall below zero (below -18C).

At the same time, there has to be a “tip of the hat” to the grunts - on both sides - who are fighting in these conditions.  Of note, over the past year in particular Ukrainian blogs have commented on the proliferation of “IR blankets” among Russian troops to mask them from IR sensors. As temperatures drop at night the process of shielding bunkers from an IR sensor would become more and more critical.

That said, neither side appears to have any advantage because of the cold.

There has been no more detailed information on the Oreshnik strike on Lviv.

v/r - pete