October 7th, 2024 Israel - Oct 7 Massacre - 1 year 

Battle of Lepanto 1571

Overall  

Ground Operations  - No change around Kursk

- Small, steady Russian gains south-east of Pokrovsk

Maritime Operations  - Russian Minesweeper in Kaliningrad damaged

Politics - Dutch F-16s arrive in Ukraine

Weather

Kharkiv

73 and rain, gusting near 20. Rain continues through Tuesday morning, partly cloudy into Saturday, then rain returns. Daily lows near 50, daily highs in the 70s. Winds variable, 5-15kts.

Melitopol

65 and light rain, gusting over 25. Mostly sunny through the week, rain returns next weekend. Daily lows in the upper 40s, daily highs in the upper 60s. Winds variable, 5-15kts.

Kyiv

54 and cloudy, gusting to 20. Rain tonight, then ending by early morning tomorrow and then party cloudy for the week. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the 60s. Winds variable, 5-15kts.

Ground Operations

Kursk Salient

Fighting continued along most of the perimeter of the Kursk salient and in the smaller incursion further west, but there were few gains. Russian forces were confirmed to have made some small gains east of Korenevo but these were the only confirmed gains in the last three days. Anecdotal reporting however points to Russian forces slowly building along the perimeter, suggesting Russian forces are taking a methodical approach to massing forces to squeeze the salient closed. Anecdotal reports also suggest that Russian forces have become “generous” in their use of artillery, drones and air strikes on their own terrain, which also suggests they are going to soften-up Ukrainian positions and then attack with a preponderance of force. That said, it would seem they would want to do that fairly quickly, before the fall “mud season” further complicates the operation.

North of Kharkiv

Fighting continued in both the small Russian salients but there was little to show for the effort, with Russians making small gains in Vovchansk on the 4th, but nothing else of note.

North of the Donets River

Fighting continued along most of the line of contact throughout the weekend; Russian sources claimed some gains south-west of Kupyansk but there were no confirmed gains. However, blogger reporting continues to report small but real gains west of Pishchane, where Russian forces now have what appears to be a roughly 2 mile wide (north to south) front that is less than 2,000 meters from the Oskil River. As a reminder, the real key in this push is to reach the Oskil, and then push south perhaps another mile and seize the bridge that crosses the Oskil into Senkove. This is the most southern heavy bridge (the other is in Kupyansk) that can take a main battle tank.

With the start of the rains the terrain on both banks of the Zherebets will become very muddy and difficult to move in and there will probably be even less ground gains in the area than is usual in the summer or winter.

Bakhmut

North and north-east of Bakhmut there continues to be a good deal of fighting reported in the general area east and south-east of Siversk, but there were no confirmed gains.

West of Bakhmut fighting continues north, east and south of Chasiv Yar; while there were again no confirmed gains, Ukrainian General Staff reporting noted engagements just east of Bila Hora and Stupochky, suggesting Russian forces continue to grind forward.

Further south of Bakhmut, west of Horlivka, Russian forces continued to claim small gains westward, pushing deeper into Toretsk, one street at a time; small gains were confirmed on the 3rd, but later claims cannot be confirmed in commercial imagery. Nevertheless, the various blogs are reporting that perhaps as much as 1/2 of Toretsk has now been taken by Russian infantry.

Donetsk City

Multiple Russian movements, and gains, were reported throughout the weekend along much of the west, south-west and south side of the salient, as well as west of Heorhivka.

Gains were noted each day; of note on the 4th were Russian forces taking Maksymilyanivka, a bit more than a mile west of Hostre. On the 5th reporting suggested that Russian forces were pushing into Ostrivske (just north-west of Maksymilyanivka) but only their movement along the eastern edge of the town could be confirmed. Taking these two towns would tie into the 6 mile long Vovcha River Reservoir and present Ukrainian troops between this line of towns and the Pokrovsk salient with a long, more difficult exit if they wish to avoid getting caught in another pocket. 

On the 5th and 6th Russian forces were confirmed to have made gains south-west of Novohrodivka (about 7 miles south-east of Pokrovsk) and to have pushed further into Tsukuryne (about 4 miles due south of Selydove). Yesterday the Russian Ministry of Defense reported that the town had fallen, and though this has not been confirmed, it is likely. With the capture of this town (Tsukuryne), and pressing further west from Novohrodivka, the Russians are now generating another pocket, this one around Selydove. If they can force the Ukrainians out of Selydove, they will be able to close off all but the E50 roadway from the west, and attack Pokrovsk from the east and south simultaneously.

Reporting from Pokrovsk claimed that 80% of the critical infrastructure in Pokrovsk has been destroyed as a result of artillery fire.

Fighting continued north and west of Vuhledar but there were no confirmed gains or losses in this area.

Southern Ukraine

From the vicinity of Velyka Novosilke, past Robotyne, to the Dnepr River and down the Dnepr to the mouth, Russian forces continue to conduct small probes, fly reconnaissance drones over Ukrainian territory, and change artillery and sniper fire. Most Russian forces are infantry  and the use of light small vehicles has been reported repeatedly, with very few armored vehicles noted. There is speculation among bloggers that the Russians are preparing for an attack north somewhere along the southern front, complimenting attacks towards Pokrovsk and attacks from the general area of Vuhledar, but currently that remains mainly speculation.

However, further west, on the banks of the Dnepr, an as yet unconfirmed report suggests that Russian forces pushed across the former reservoir in the Dnepr River (now dry land) immediately west of Kamyanske, and have pressed into the town of Plavni. If so, this should be confirmed in the next day or two.

Air Operations

On the 6th and this morning Russian missiles and drones struck across Ukraine, to include at least 2 x Kinzhal ballistic missiles striking Starokostyantniv airfield in west Ukraine (airbase for the SU-24M and at least a part-timebase for the F-16s, but there is no hard count yet as to the number of missiles or drones, nor has there been any damage reports.

Kinzhal missiles were reportedly fired into the Kyiv area as well, but again no details.

Multiple power outages were reported across Ukraine, but extent and duration were not reported.

Ukrainian forces launched at least 12 drones into Crimea and appear to have damaged another oil facility at Feodosia.

On the 5th Russian forces launched 2 x Iskander class ballistic missiles, 1 x Kh-59/69 cruise missile, 1 x Iskander cruise missile, and 87 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 2 missiles (not ID’d but presumably the cruise missiles), and 56 drones, and they claimed that 25 drones were “lost” (bought down by electronic warfare (EW)). There was no official statement on the 2 ballistic missiles or the 6 drones.

Independent reports noted a warehouse fire and a gas fire (locations not noted), and damage to a cargo ship in Odessa. Additional damage to Odessa’s airfield and port infrastructure was reported by Russian bloggers

On the 4th Russian forces launched 3 x Kh-59/69 cruise missiles and 13 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian airspace. The UAF reported shooting down 3 drones and that the other 10 “got lost,” (EW). They also claimed that the cruise missiles did not reach their target -  but were not claimed as shot down, so, were somehow defeated by EW. The Kh-59 is targeted with a TV in the nose linked to the launch aircraft; jamming the video link can defeat the missile; the Kh-69 has an advanced inertial nav system and more advanced software that is designed to assume control if the link is jammed or there is an attempted intrusion.

On the 3rd Russian forces launched 19 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 9 drones and EW defeated 7 other drones. No report was given on the remaining 3 drones.

Ukrainian forces struck a fuel storage facility near Voronezh on the night of the 3rd, damaging at least one large fuel tank.

Maritime Operations

Russian minesweeper Alexander Obukhov, an Alexandrit class mine sweeper, home-ported in Baltiysk, in Kaliningrad, has been put out of action as a result of sabotage, so claims Ukraine’s Military Intelligence Directorate (GUR). Apparently the ship “developed a leak” in a gas duct and the engine room began to flood. 

Politics 

Netherlands announced that the first “batch” of F-16s had arrived in Ukraine. 
It wasn’t clear how many had in fact arrived, but the Netherlands has confirmed that they still provide a total of 24 x F-16s to Ukraine.

Victor Bout, the somewhat infamous arms dealer, who was traded for Ms. Britney Griner, December 8th 2022, is now involved with working with Houthis to negotiate the purchase of weapons from Moscow.

Lithuanian customs officers inspected a train from Kaliningrad to Moscow and found 5 Russian uniforms and a small amount of military gear, which has been seized. This is the 5th time that military related items have been found on the trains between Russian and Kaliningrad since September 17th.

Economic Reporting

Feb 22   Mar 7   Jun10-22Jun8-23 Jun7 Jul9 Aug8 Sep9 Oct4 Oct7

Brent      94.71      119.50 120.90    75.58      80.06 85.19 78.02 71.74 78.13 79.75

WTI     92.10      123.80 119.50  71.29      75.81 81.73 75.03 68.37 74.24 76.22

NG       3.97       4.45     8.41      2.15      2.82 2.38 2.08 2.20 2.86 2.82

Wheat     8.52       12.94    10.71    6.17       6.40 5.71 5.38 5.67 6.04 5.90

Ruble     85         145.70  58.48     82.59      88.77 88.18 86.98 90.75 95.25 96.40

Hryvnia Pre Oct 2023 fixed at 36.4 40.78 40.89 41.16 41.18

Urals 56.56    67.61 67.61 72.14 78.83 71.56 73.30

ESPO   67.02      65 77 77

Sokol 70.82 66.23 70.52 70.35

Thoughts

Russian and Ukrainian propaganda has some fairly common “tells,” one of them is that when they believe bad news about their own forces is about to become public, they release something else about the other side about how awful things are for them, with any numbers usually inflated quite a bit. In Ukraine’s case, they sometimes get someone else to release it, often the Brits MODUK. In this case MODUK has just announced that Russian losses in September were the worst of the year, with more than 30,000 casualties during the month of September. While they may have been - it's difficult to tell, and the one open source (and shown to be fairly reliable - Mediazone) doesn’t show that number, and in fact shows less than half that number.

Meanwhile, the situation around Pokrovsk is looking more grim every day, the Kursk salient is under great strain, and the loss of Vuhledar is just starting to sink in. If the report concerning Kamyanske is accurate that will simply add to the list of problems that Ukraine has to deal with.

And so, the report is that Russian losses are massive, Russian forces at the front are receiving less and less training, etc. What remains to be seen is whether this is simply in response to the current news (Vuhledar’s fall, the fighting around Pokrovsk, etc.) or is it in anticipation of an additional problem, such as an evacuation from Pokrovsk.

v/r pete