September 30th, 2024 

Overall  

Ground Operations - Russia Closing on Vuhledar

- Ukrainians small gains west of Kursk

- Russians gains on both sides of salient

- More Russian gains south-east of Pokrovsk

Air Operations - Grid hit, Hospital hit

Politics - LTG Budanov out?

Weather

Autumn is here, temperatures a bit lower this week, and the first few days of rain. 

Kharkiv

66 and clear. Sunny to partly cloudy through middle of next week. Daily lows in the 50s, daily highs in the 70s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

72 and mostly cloudy. Mostly sunny through Friday. Daily lows near 50, daily highs in the 70s. Winds easterly, 5-15kts.

Kyiv

52 and cloudy, gusting over 25. Rain later tonight, cloudy this week, rain Friday through Sunday. Daily lows in the upper 40s, daily highs near 70. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Ground Operations

Kursk Salient

Fighting continued throughout the weekend, with some gains noted; Ukrainian forces west of the main salient, near the town of Veseloye, made some gains into that town on the 28th. In the main salient Russian forces appear to have made gains on both the west and east sides of the salient on both the 27th and 29th.

North of Kharkiv

Fighting continued throughout the weekend in both the small pockets occupied by the Russians, but there were no gains noted on either side.

North of the Donets River

Russian forces continued to make gains south-east of Kupyansk and, per a Ukrainian battalion commander in the area, Russian forces have complete control of Pishchane and the immediate area, are pressing on the town of Kolisnykivka and Kruhlyakivka (both are on the east bank of the Oskil River) and are, in fact 2 kilometers from the Oskil River. Kruhlyakivka (the southern-most of the town towns) has a bridge across the Oskil, one that is strong enough to take the weight of a T-72 tank.

Elsewhere fighting continues along the entire line of contact.

Bakhmut

Fighting continued north-east and north of Bakhmut, and west of Bakhmut, throughout the weekend but there were no confirmed gains or losses by either side. Of note, Russian forces continue to attack from just east of Bila Hora, west of the Donets Canal, and at least one major Ukrainian blogger is showing Russian forces as having cleared out all the terrain east of the Donets canal, south of Bakhmut, and have moved well west of the canal in the area south of Chasiv Yar. If this is accurate, holding Chasiv Yar is going to become difficult, quickly.

Further south, west of Horlivka, Russian forces continued to make small, steady gains into Toretsk, as well as making gains westward - immediately south of Toretsk.

Donetsk City

As of the 27th Russian forces had pushed into the south side of Selydove (south-east of Pokrovsk) even as Russian units just south of the town continue to push westward, moving into position to strike Ukrainian forces in the town on their right flank. Russian forces due east of Pokrovsk also made gains and now are confirmed to be in control of Krasnyi Yar. Russian forces continued action elsewhere, along essentially the entire perimeter of the salient, pushing westward and south-westward, even as Russian forces west of Heorhivka and Hostre continue to push west and north-west. The pocket west of Nevelske (north of Krasnohorivka) is steadily collapsing, though it is not clear how many Ukrainian forces remain inside the pocket.

Russian forces continue to make gains in their effort to circle Vuhledar, moving further westward from the Vodyane area (north of Vuhledar). There were, however, no confirmed gains made into Vuhledar over the weekend, though some Russian reports claimed such gains.

Of note, further west, Russian forces continue to press up the T0509 roadway and are now about 2 miles east of Velyka Novosilke, as well as being less than 2 miles south of that town.

 Southern Ukraine 

Fighting continued across southern Ukraine, particularly north and north-west of Robotyne, as well as along the Dnepr River; there were no confirmed changes to the front line, but there are unconfirmed reports that Russian forces have taken control of several islands in the Dnepr, south of Kherson city.

Air operations

This morning  Russia forces launched 1 x  Iskander ballistic missile, 1 x Kh-59/69 cruise missile, 1 Kh-31P anti-radiation missile, and 73 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 67 drones and the Kh-59/69 cruise missile; 1 drone flew into Belarus, and 3 drones we’re defeated by electronic warfare.

While the UAF claimed only 2 Shaheds, the Iskander and the Kh-31P managed to get past air defenses, they did report that the power grid was damaged by “falling debris” in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Kherson, Odessa, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts, and there were temporary blackouts in Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.

Ukrainian drones struck a Russian ammo depot at night on 28 September, near Kotluban (about 30 miles north-north-west of Volgograd) and Ukrainian forces claimed that a shipment of Iranian rockets had just arrived at the facility. 

However, Commercial imagery from 29 September confirmed earlier reports the  that ammo dump was not damaged by the fire. Commercial satellite imagery showed a fire in the general area of the ammo dump but there were no indications of damage on the facility. 

Russian MinDef spokesman claimed Russian forces shot down 125 drones during the night of 28 September.

On the Night of September 28th Russian forces launched 22 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space and the UAF claimed it shot down 15 drones; drones were reported to have hit a school, an unidentified building in Odessa, and, in successive attacks, a hospital in Sumy. At least 6 people were killed and 11 injured in the hospital.

Russian tacair struck infrastructure targets in Zaporizhzhia City on Sunday morning. Totals for the last week included 900 glide bombs, more than 40 missiles and more than 300 x Shahed drones.

On the night of 27 September Russian forces launched 2 x Iskander class ballistic missiles, 2 x Kh-59/69 cruise missiles and 73 Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed that it shot down 2 x cruise missiles and 69, 3 drones were “lost,” (defeated by electronic warfare) and 1 returned to Russian air space.

The UAF later reported that on the 27th, 2 missiles - not further identified - struck Starokostyantniv, which appears to be an acknowledgment that the 2 x Iskander class missiles hit the air base. This airfield may also have been hit by 2 x Kinzhal missiles pn the 26th.

Russian forces conducted a strike on the night of the 26th consisting of 1 x Iskander-M class ballistic missile,  2 x Kh-22 cruise missiles, and 32 x Shahed drones. The UAF claimed it shot down 24 drones, 1 drone was “lost” (forced down by electronic warfare), and 1 veered off into Romanian air space. There was no immediate report of the damage caused by the 6 dozens that were not shot down, nor was there a report on the drone over Romania.

Aid

Denmark will invest 575 million Euros ($644 million) in the Ukrainian Defense Industrial Base, 30% from the Danish budget, 70% from profits from Russian assets.

Politics and Diplomacy

The Rumor from Kyiv is that LTG Budanov, Director of Defense Intelligence, may be replaced in the near future, to be replaced by Oleh Ivashchenko, current head of the Foreign Intelligence Service. The apparent reason is a personality conflict between Budanov and President Zelenskyy’s chief of staff Andrei Yermak.

Budanov will reportedly be offered ambassadorial position, but to which country was not known.

Economic Reporting

Feb 22   Mar 7   Jun10-22Jun8-23 Jun7 Jul9 Aug8 Sep9 Sep27 Sep30

Brent      94.71      119.50 120.90    75.58      80.06 85.19 78.02 71.74 71.75 71.55

WTI     92.10      123.80 119.50  71.29      75.81 81.73 75.03 68.37 67.88 67.91

NG       3.97       4.45     8.41      2.15      2.82 2.38 2.08 2.20 2.73 2.90

Wheat     8.52       12.94    10.71    6.17       6.40 5.71 5.38 5.67 5.84 5.80

Ruble     85         145.70  58.48     82.59      88.77 88.18 86.98 90.75 92.87 93.10

Hryvnia Pre Oct 2023 fixed at 36.4 40.78 40.89 41.16 41.22

Urals 56.56    67.61 67.61 72.14 78.83 67.15 65.72

ESPO  67.02      65 77 77

SOKOL 70.82 66.23 64.97 66.36

Thoughts

Reporting from the Kursk salient has been very conservative but there is some evidence - per some of the bloggers  - that Russian forces are building on the south-east corner of the salient as well as the north-west corner and that the Russian forces have enough assets to drive through the salient and these two forces will meet just inside the Ukrainian border, cutting off Ukrainian forces in Sudzha.

At the same time Russian forces continue their efforts to circle Vuhledar and reportedly asked the Ukrainian commander if he wished to surrender; the Ukrainian refused. Some bloggers are, as of yesterday, showing Vuhledar as being effectively curled, that only a handful of Ukrainians can get in or out on any given day.

Russian forces are also gaining ground around Selydove and unconfirmed reports suggest they have gained ground on the north side of the town, again setting up an encirclement of Ukrainian forces.

The point is that there is little decidedly bad news on the ground for the Russians, and a good deal of potentially bad news for the Ukrainians. 

The weather has begun to change and whether this will slow down the Russian grind or simply inhibit Ukrainian logistics isn’t clear, but it would seem that the next few weeks could see significant changes to the front lines.

v/r pete

 Unambiguous Ambiguity (September 29, 2024) 

Tsar Vlad I is in the news again, talking about nuclear weapons. The news media reports he has changed his nuclear policy but I wonder if that is so. I say that for a simple reason: Russia’s nuclear policy is Vlad Putin’s nuclear policy. He is the guy who will order nuclear weapons be used; he and he alone is 100% of the vote. Other people will be needed, but he is the guy making the decision. So, the policy has always been what he wanted it to be. Yes, he did change some wording, making it clear that there are a number of considerations beyond what was previously released for general consumption. But wasn’t he always able to consider those options?

Interesting thing about nuclear weapon use; in one of those statements that makes ever more sense the more you think about it, then President-Elect Kennedy was given a word of advice by President Eisenhower’s National Security Advisor who told Kennedy that he had to sit down and work out exactly what his real use criteria was for nuclear weapons. And once he was sure of when he would, in fact, use nuclear weapons he must tell absolutely no one.

In short, it had to be crystal clear and unambiguous to the whole world that he would use nuclear weapons, and it also needed to be decidedly ambiguous to everyone as to when that might take place; there was a real line, but he must not let anyone know exactly where it was.

One of the fascinating - and scary - events that keep repeating themselves throughout history is how many times leaders tell their enemies exactly what they intend to do and no one listens.

People throughout history have a remarkable ability to hear and read exactly what they want to hear and read, no matter what is in front of them. The most glaring case in recent history, is, of course, Hitler, who forecast much of what he intended to do in Mein Kampf, which was widely published, and then virtually no one believed him. 

And so we have the man who controls the largest nuclear arsenal in the world - Putin - talking about nuclear weapon use, and it raises the question: is he trying to tell us something and we don’t want to hear it?

If you read between the lines of what he said he seems to me to be saying "when I think something is really threatening Russia, I AM going to feel free to use nuclear weapons to protect my country.” So far, presumably, he has not felt that Russia is threatened. And he wants to keep it that way. So, he is trying to tell us that, in fact, there is a line out there that we shouldn’t cross. And as much as much as he does not want to tell us exactly where the line is, he is trying to make it clear that there is a line and we are approaching it.

Now, of course he could just be blowing smoke and he has no intention of using nuclear weapons. We can, of course, call his bluff. But we should be careful as to how we describe that. Because this isn't a card game, and we aren’t going to lose a big stack of chips. This is more like a game of chicken, two very fast cars racing at each other; who blinks first and steers right? Get this wrong and a lot of people die.

In his book “On Escalation," Herman Kahn quoted the economist and foreign policy advisor Thomas Schelling that “Chicken is a game that it takes two “not” to play.

Schelling noted that "the game [of chicken] can involve some bargaining. The two players may wish to signal to each other that they will settle for something like a tie, each pulling a little to one side if the other does, yet watching to see whether the other responds. This is a game in which it is usually better to be opposed by a good player than poor player.”

We need to learn how to play this game. And we need to be aware that Putin is playing this game. And how we play this game will affect how well we can play this game when we need to play it with Emperor Xi, which is going to be upon us very soon. We are living in a fantasy if we think that either of these confrontations - Russia or China - does not and will not involve nuclear weapons. Whether they are actually detonated or just presented, that depends on how well the game is played.

As Schelling noted, nations sometimes may find themselves in a game of chicken as part of "a deliberate showdown," and sometimes they are "pushed by events" in other countries. But, as he says: “deterrent expectations must be maintained,” yet, we don’t want to fight a nuclear war.

In short, we are back to the sage advice given to President Kennedy: we must be absolutely crystal clear, with Tsar Putin, with Emperor Xi, with Ayatollah Khamenei, with Kim Jong Un, that there is some point at which we will in fact use nuclear weapons. As to when, they need to be guessing… Unambiguous ambiguity.       

 September 27th, 2024 

Overall  

Ground Operations - Russia Closing on Vuhledar

         - Russian, Ukrainian army no gains in Kursk salient

         - More Russian gains south-east of Pokrovsk

Aid          - Aid package still not defined

Weather

Autumn is here but still no autumnal rains in the forecast.

Kharkiv

75 and mostly cloudy. Sunny to partly cloudy through middle of next week. Daily lows in the 50s, daily highs in the 70s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

78 and clear, gusting to 20. Sunny to partly cloudy through middle of next week. Daily lows in the 50s, daily highs in the upper 70s. Winds easterly, 5-15kts.

Kyiv

70 and cloudy, gusting over 25. Partly cloudy Saturday, then cloudy through Tuesday. Daily lows in the 50s, daily highs in the 60s. Winds variable, 15-20kts.

Ground Operations

Kursk Salient

Ukrainian and Russian forces remain active along virtually the entire perimeter of the Kursk salient, as well as south of Veseloye (to the west of the salient) but there were no confirmed gains by either side.

Nevertheless, various blogs continue to show marginal Russian gains along most of the perimeter, and they appear to have slowly chewed into the entire edge of the salient.

North of Kharkiv

There were no confirmed gains by either side in either of the two small salients north of Kharkiv, though there are claims of small Russian gains south of Hlyboke (due north of Kharkiv).

North of the Donets River

Fighting continues along virtually the entire line of contact; there were no confirmed gains by either side. There are claims of further Russian gains around Makiivka and Nevske (south-west of Svatove, on the Zherebets River), as well as claims of more ground gained in the vicinity of Pishchane (north-west of Svatove). Conservative blogger maps now show Russian forces west of Pishchane a bit less than 2,000 meters from the Oskil River.

Bakhmut

Fighting continues north-east of Bakhmut, in a broad arc north-east to south-east of Siversk, but there were no confirmed gains or losses.

In the general area west of Bakhmut Russian forces had small confirmed gains north of Chasiv Yar (west of Kalynivka) and more gains were claimed but not confirmed to the south of Chasiv Yar (east of Stupochky).

Fighting continues west of Horlivka but there were no confirmed gains in or to the south of Torestsk or in Niu York.

Donetsk City

Russian forces continue to grind out gains east and south-east of Pokrovsk. To the immediate east Russian forces have been confirmed in the towns of Mykolaivka and north Hirnyk.

The Ukrainian General Staff (UGS) reports fighting taking place in Lysivka (immediately south-east of Pokrovsk), and RuAF tacair strikes along the entire front in this area; and the pocket west of Nevelske, north of Hostre, is now only 2 miles wide, east to west (it was 7 miles deep at the beginning of the week).

Further south there is little new to report except in Vuhledar where it appears that Russian forces have pressed perhaps another 150 feet into the city; that is, they appear to have taken the first 3 or 4 buildings on the west side of 13th Desantnykiv street. There continue to be unconfirmed reports that Ukrainian forces are withdrawing from Vuhledar, but the Ukrainian army insists this is not the case and that they will hold Vuhledar. There are, reportedly, 2,000 troops left in Vuhledar, the bulk of them from the 72nd Mechanized Infantry Brigade, plus small elements from several other units.

Assuming that that is so, this is shaping up to be another bloody street-to-street, building-to-building, house-to-house gun fight. The one difference between this and several earlier, similar fights is that the Russians do in fact appear to have cut off the bulk of the logistics support into the city.

Southern Ukraine

Bloggers continue to report activity just south of Velyka Novosilke and Ukrainian sources are reporting that additional Russian forces are being moved into the area in anticipation of several thrusts to the north.

Fighting also continues south of Orikhiv, and there are skirmishes and probes along the Dnepr, but there were no confirmed changes in the front line.

Air Operations

This morning Russian forces launched a series of missiles and drones into southern Ukraine, at least one missile striking the National Police regional headquarters building in Kryvyi Rih and causing significant damage to the building and injuring at least 5.

Damage was also reported in Odessa Oblast and at least 3 civilians were killed.

Damage to the power grid in the last 24 hours has forced electric power cuts in the Donetsk, Kharkiv and Kherson Oblasts.

As of this morning 26,275 consumers had no electricity.

Ukrainian drones struck Novoshakhtinsk in Rostov Oblast early and as a result of the attack a fire caused damage to power transmission lines, and power may have ben lost to part of the city.

Russian air defense forces claimed to have shot down 7 x drones.

The Russia strike on the night of the 25th included 2 x ballistic missiles (type not known), 4 x Kh-59/69 cruise missiles, and 78 x Shahed drones. The UAF claimed it shot down the 4 cruise missiles, and 66 drones. 8 of the remaining 12 drones were “lost” (defeated by electronic warfare) and 1 returned to Russian airspace. No results were given for the 3 remaining Shaheds.

As for the 3 x Kh-47 Kinzhal’s fired at Starokostyantyniv airfield (125 miles east of Lviv), the home base of the SU-24M wing and reportedly one of the operating bases for the F-16s.

Russian bloggers claimed 2 - 4 x F-16s were damaged or destroyed, Ukrainian government offices and bloggers claimed there was only damage to the power grid.

The RuAF dropped more than 900 glide bombs in the last week, and they appear to have settled into pace of about 100 glide bomb strike sorties per day.

Politics and Diplomacy

President Zelenskyy and former President Trump will meet today at Trump Tower in New York City.

The specific contents of the $8 billion package President Biden announced still has not been released.

Economic Reporting

Feb 22   Mar 7   Jun10-22Jun8-23 Jun7 Jul9 Aug8 Sep9 Sep26 Sep27

Brent      94.71      119.50 120.90    75.58      80.06 85.19 78.02 71.74 71.76 71.75

WTI     92.10      123.80 119.50  71.29      75.81 81.73 75.03 68.37 68.01 67.88

NG       3.97       4.45     8.41      2.15      2.82 2.38 2.08 2.20 2.59 2.73

Wheat     8.52       12.94    10.71    6.17       6.40 5.71 5.38 5.67 5.89 5.84

Ruble     85         145.70  58.48     82.59      88.77 88.18 86.98 90.75 92.73 92.87

Hryvnia Pre Oct 2023 fixed at 36.4 40.78 40.89 41.16 41.16

Urals 56.56    67.61 67.61 72.14 78.83 69.49 67.15

ESPO  67.02      65 77 77

SOKOL 70.82 66.23 64.81 64.97

Thoughts

The war grinds on. As mentioned before, there is a disconcerting disconnect between the Russian army and ground operations on one hand, and the rest of the world on the other; nothing that happens for good or ill seems to affect the Russian army’s slow, brutal grind.

An observation made decades ago by a Russia army defector noted that the West wanted an army with high quality training and the ability to conduct sophisticated warfare, the Russian (and Soviet) leadership wanted predictability. A very slow, cumbersome army that stayed away from clever tactics or anything that might result in rapid changes on the battlefield because those changes would also mean risk. And risk was to be avoided.

Whether that was completely accurate isn’t clear, but there certainly are traces of that on the battlefield in eastern and southern Ukraine: very slow, deliberate movements, a very simple set of tactics, very simple operating procedures. Included in this is a great deal of artillery, and the Russians are moving forward in engagements of very low risk.

And, while they are making gains in the east, there appears to be efforts to “sniff out” spots in the south where they might also press on the Ukrainian line.

Perhaps the Ukrainian engineers have in fact been building some hard defensive lines they can fall back on in the next few months and from which they can launch an offensive in winter; we’ll see.

But right now it looks as of the Russian army, whether there are deep strikes into Russia or not, will in the next month or two, circle Vuhledar, take Pokrovsk (or at least neutralize it) push the line in the south back, take Torestsk, and possibly take Chasiv Yar.

v/r pete