October 23rd, 2024

Overall  

Ground Operations - More Russian gains 

Air Operations  - North Korean Air Force Pilots?

Politics  - US: $20 billion loan

- SecDef Austin: Ukraine can defeat Russia

Weather

Kharkiv

59 and sunny. Partly cloudy to sunny through the weekend. Daily lows in the low 40s to 30s, daily highs in the low 50s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

59 and sunny. Sunny to partly cloudy through the weekend, except Friday, which will be overcast. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the upper 50s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Kyiv

54 and sunny, gusting over 25. Partly cloudy to cloudy for the next 5 days. Daily lows around 40, windchills in the 30s, daily highs in the 50s. Winds variable, 5-10kts, except Wednesday and Thursday, westerly, 10-15kts.

Ground Operations 

Kursk Salient

Russian forces gained ground south-east of Korenevo amid what is described as intense fighting. Fighting also continues west of the salient, south-west of Glushkovo, but there were no confirmed gains or losses of terrain. Bloggers report that Ukrainian forces have moved M1 tanks into the fight in the salient. Russian forces east of Korenevo continue to push eastward and there is a pocket north of these forces (north-west of Malaya Loknya) which threatens to be cut off, isolating the roughly a brigade of Ukrainian troops.

North of Kharkiv

Fighting continues but there were no confirmed gains or losses.

Anecdotal reporting suggests that Russian forces have introduced wire-guided drones in this sector to avoid electronic warfare efforts (EW)

Both sides are experimenting with wire guided drones; the advantages and limitations are obvious: negates EW but limits the drone's range to the length of the wire spool, wire spool also affects payload, and the wire can easily be caught on all sorts of things. There should be some interesting lessons learned from this particular effort.

North of the Donets River

Russian forces continued operations along virtually the entire line of contact but there were no confirmed gains or losses. However, pro-Ukraine bloggers are reporting that Russian forces pushing west from Pishchane reached the Oskil River south of Kolisnykivka and have turned and are pushing south, following the river.

Bakhmut

Fighting continues north-east of of Bakhmut but there has been no confirmed change in the front lines.

Fighting continues west of Bakhmut; there were no confirmed changes in front lines over the past 2 days, but a review of the Ukrainian-leaning blog sites show Russian gains over the past week or two have resulted in firm holds on terrain on the west side of the Donets canal, both north and south of Chasiv Yar. Russian troops took control of the Block 9 Cola mine just east of Chasiv Yar, as early as last Thursday (the 17th), and have slowly closed on Stuchovsky.

Russian forces continue to press on Toretsk and there are unconfirmed reports that additional Russian forces are being moved into the Torestk area. Russian forces also appear to be staring a push westward from Niu York.

Donetsk City

Fighting continues along the west and south perimeters of the Pokrovsk salient but there were no confirmed gains by Russian forces. The ground remains muddy following recent rains and this probably counts. For the last few days of limited infantry and mounted actions, but this was offset by and increase in artillery fire form the Russians.

South of the salient Russian forces continue to ground out small gains west of Kurakhoove.

Further south, Russian forces gained ground north of Vodyane. Russian forces now control Kostyantynivka and are pressing into Katerynivka. Taking these two towns will eliminate the threat to the Russian flank int he area and allow the Russians to close up and straighten their lines northward to the area of Maksymilianivka.

Skirmishes and artillery fire was reported across southern Ukraine but there were no substantive ground operations.

 Air and Maritime Operations

The Republic of Korea is reporting that it has intelligence that North Korea has sent a number of fighter pilots to Russia to fly combat missions and gain experience.

The only aircraft the NKAF flies that is in the Russian inventory is the MiG-29; the NKAF has 35 x MiG-29s. However, NKAF aircrew reportedly receive, at best, 25 - 30 fight hours per year, which would mean they would be able to contribute very little to the effort. They would, however, be able to greatly benefit, assuming they survive, and it would seem to be to be worth it to send some aircrew to Russia where they might get perhaps the equivalent of more than a year’s flying in less than a month, and it would be combat flight time.

This would be the first NKAF deployment outside of Korea since some pilots flew for the Syrian and Egyptians in the Yom Kippur War.

On the night of October 21-22 a Ukrainian drone strike damaged Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) and Federal Security Service (FSB) facilities in Yefremov and Luzhlovsky, as well as a synthetic rubber plant and two distilleries that make ethyl alcohol for weapons manufacturing.

Russian forces claimed Russian naval aircraft destroyed 4 of 4 unmanned surface vehicles (USVs - waterborne drones) west of Crimea yesterday.

Russian air defense forces claimed they destroyed 78 x Ukrainian drones during the past 24 hours. There was no comment as to how many drones were launched into Russian air space.

On the night of October 21-22 Russian forces launched 60 x Shahed drones. The UAF claimed it shot down 17 drones, 10 drones were "lost" (EW).

On the night of October 20-21 Russian forces launched 1 x Iskander class ballistic missile, 1 x Kkh-35, 1 x Kh-31P, and 116 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 59 drones and 45 drones were “lost” (brought down by EW). 

Russian bloggers claim the Iskander missile struck a hotel filled with western EW specialists; this remains rumor.

A Russian microelectronics manufacturer “Kremniy El Group” has temporarily suspended  operations following a Ukrainian drone strike on 18 Oct.

President Zelenskyy commented that between January 1st and October 18th the Russians had launched 6,130 x Shahed drones against Ukrainian targets.

Politics and Diplomacy

The US will provide $20 billion as part of a $50 billion loan guarantee from the G7 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Uk, and the US). The $50 billion is backed by more than $300 billion in frozen Russian assets.

SecDef Austin, in interview with Fox News, opined that Ukraine can defeat Russia, without long range strike capabilities.

"I think they (Ukrainians) have the ability to continue to conduct long range strikes, and they will. Ukraine has a lot of capability that we provided in terms of drones.”

"They're highly effective. As a matter of fact, we've seen them conduct attacks or operations that are some 400 kilometers beyond … the border and even further.”

"Ukraine absolutely can win. And we define winning as Ukraine being a sovereign state that can defend its territory and deter aggression in the future.”

At the same time, Julianne Smith, US Permanent Representative to NATO, commented that:

”The alliance has not, to date, reached the point where it is prepared to offer membership or an invitation to Ukraine. Our intent is to keep moving them closer to NATO.”

A poll by an independent polling group (Chronicles), during September, shows high levels of support for Putin, with 78% generally approving of Putin. Further questions showed that most are concerned with, and wish Putin would focus on, domestic and economic issues. Time Magazine reported that only 14% approved of Putin’s foreign policy, which seems to miss the point that 3 out of 4 support Putin,evne if they would like change.

Ukrainian Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin has resigned following exposure of a scandal in which of government officials avoided military service by being designated as disabled.

Economic Reporting

Feb 22   Mar 7   Jun10-22 Jun8-23 Jun7 Jul9 Sep9 Oct8 Oct21  Oct23

Brent      94.71      119.50 120.90    75.58      80.06 85.19 71.74 77.30 74.47 75.57

WTI     92.10      123.80 119.50  71.29      75.81 81.73 68.37 73.59 70.77 71.34

NG       3.97       4.45     8.41      2.15      2.82 2.38 2.20 2.74 2.32 2.35

Wheat     8.52       12.94    10.71    6.17       6.40 5.71 5.67 5.93 5.73 5.76

Ruble     85         145.70  58.48     82.59      88.77 88.18 90.75 96.83 96.20 96.45

Hryvnia Pre Oct 2023 fixed at 36.4 40.89 41.22 41.33 41.29

Urals 56.56    67.61 67.61 78.83 73.30 66.16 68.95

ESPO 65 77 77 77

Sokol 66.23 72.10 66.43 68.61

Oil prices are rising based on news out of China that Beijing is raising its import quote for 2024 from 1781 million barrels to 1884 million barrels, which means buying an additional 100 million barrels of oil in the next two months.

Thoughts 

Secretary Austin’s remarks, taken with Ambassador Smith’s remarks, would seem to signal that President Zelenskyy’s Victory plan has some gaps in it. As you will recall, Item 1 of the plan was an invitation from NATO for future membership, and Item 2 was full range use of NATO weapons to provide deep strike into Russia.

The two points were the backbone of the plan to convince Russia it could not win, and were needed in the near term, so as to set conditions to end the war in 2025.

Secretary Austin still believes Ukraine can be “a sovereign state that can defend its own territory,” but that begs the question of how the Secretary is he defining “sovereign territory?” 

Does he see Ukraine as capable of forcing Russia out of eastern Ukraine and Crimea without additional capabilities, or is he hinting at some substantive change in the capabilities of the Ukraine army and air force, but not long range strike?

Or, is the Secretary suggesting that Ukraine could establish a robust defensive line, in the east and across the south, negotiate a ceasefire and then defend a “De Militarized Zone” and maintain sovereignty to the west of that DMZ?

And they will be able to do this without being a member of NATO?

v/r pete