March 28th, 2025

Politics - Technical Issues?

- EU stiff on sanctions relief 

Combat Ops - Ukrainian cross-border ops -stalled

- The Slow Grind continues 

Weather

Kharkiv

62 and partly cloudy. Cloudy for the next five days, rain showers Monday and Tuesday. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the 50s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

63 and mostly cloudy, gusting to 20. Mostly cloudy all week, rain showers Saturday through Monday. Daily lows in the upper 40s, daily highs in the low 60s. Winds variable, 10-15kts.

Kyiv

52 and cloudy, gusting to 20. Mostly cloudy for the five days. Daily lows in the low 40s, daily highs in the 50s. Winds variable, 10-15kts.

Politics and Diplomacy

Discussions continue to work out the “technical” issues of the energy infrastructure temporary ceasefire. Issues include how precisely the ceasefire will be monitored and by whom, the limits of Russian naval movement in the Black Sea, the lifting of sanctions on Russian agriculture and agriculture related activity (fertilizers, for example) and the associated transfer of payments and international  banking access for Russian agriculture.

EU foreign affairs spokesman commented that the EU will only lift sanctions if "Russia unconditionally withdraws all Russian forces from Ukraine.” At a meeting of a “Coalition of the Willing,” EU members suggested that now is the time to tighten sanctions to ensure Russian compliance.

President Putin meanwhile suggested as a possible way hard is that Ukraine be turned over to the UN control until elections can be held.

Ground Operations

KURSK SALIENT

Russian forces continue to slowly squeeze the Ukrainian elements remaining inside Russia. There were two pockets along the border, connected by a string of smaller elements. The northern pocket is, for all intents and purposes gone, reduced to a position along the border less than a kilometer wide, the smaller pockets appear to have been taken or those troops managed to withdraw, and the large pocket between Plekhovo and the border, perhaps 8 square miles of land, is farmland cut by a river that is further cut up by small streams that feed the river. It being spring and the rivers are flooded, movement is difficult for both the Russians and Ukrainians and the defense would benefit. 

Fighting continues just across the border, north-west from Belgorod, Russian forces have pushed Ukrainian forces back towards the border at several points over the last three days. Fighting continues in and around Demidovka, and Russian forces appear to have pushed into terrain west of Demidovka, potentially isolating the Ukrainian units in that town.

NORTH OF KHARKIV

Fighting continues in Vovchansk but there were no confirmed changes reported.

NORTH OF THE DONETS RIVER

Fighting continues along most of the line of contact.  In the center of the line, east of Borova, Ukrainian forces were confirmed to have pushed further east, near Zeleny Hai (about 8 miles north-east of Borova). At the same time, Ukrainian forces continue to hold Nadia. This presents an opportunity for the Ukrainians if they can get enough troops into this fight, to isolate and circle Russian positions between Zeleny Hai and Nadia (elements of the Russian 25th Guard Motorized Rifle Brigade). At the same time, these narrow thrusts by the Ukrainians can be pinched off and the Ukrainians end up being circled.

Further south, Russian forces had confirmed gains just west of Myrne (Myrne is on the west side of the Zherebets River, opposite Yampolivka). Some reporting suggests Russian forces have complete control of Myrne, and also are gaining ground to the north.

BAKHMUT

Fighting continues north and north-east of Bakhmut, but there has been no confirmed changes in the front line

In Chasiv Yar, west of Bakhmut, the fighting has condensed down to the last two streets of central Chasiv Yar, but there has been no movement in the last several days. 

If this goes as per previous towns, the Russians will use FAB-500 bombs to reduce the several very hard points, and then artillery fire to pound the rest of the buildings.

Further south, in Toretsk, both Russian and Ukrainian forces had gains, with Ukrainian forces slightly expanding their lodgment in the center of the town, while Russian forces pushed back into northern Toretsk, regained parts of central Toretsk, and also appear to have retaken terrain south-west of Toretsk.

DONETSK CITY

Fighting continues along virtually the enter perimeter of the Pokrovsk salient. 

South-west of Pokrovsk Ukrainian forces continue to attack in the Kotlyne area and made small but important gains yesterday, pushing Russian forces out of the town center. Russian forces at the same time made gains in Lysivka (south-east of Pokrovsk) and were noted on the attack in 24 towns along the perimeter of the salient.

Mornings have recently been very foggy and Russian forces are using the fog to move forward without being detected by Ukrainian drones.

South of the salient Russian forces continue to push west and have reached the eastern edge of Oleksiivka, the town just west of Andriivka, on the north side of the Vovcha River. The town of Kostyantynopil does not appear to be completely in Russian, presumably they are still clearing the town, and Ukrainian forces appear to have recently regained a tree line just south of the town.

Further south, Russian forces operating north-west from Velyka Novosilke, basically following the line of the Mokri Yaky River, appear to have reached the area just south of the town of Vesele, while also pushing from Pryvilne to Vilne Pole. The key here is that the Russians are pressing on the last east-west Ukrainian defensive line across southern Ukraine; the line begins in the Vesele area. So, pushing through Velese would leave the Russians both north and south of the start of the line and allow them to move rapidly across the south.

SOUTHERN UKRAINE

Imagery confirmed that Russian forces have reached the center of Shcherbaky, west of Orikhov. Fighting continues from Shcherbaky, west to Kamyanske and the Dnepr River, to include the town (east to west) of Mali Shcherbaky, Stepove, and Lokhove.

Air Operations

During the night of March 27-28, Russian forces launched 163 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 89 drones and 51 drones were “lost” (defeated by EW). Damage was reported in Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Odessa, Poltava, Sumy, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.

During the night of March 26, Russian forces launched an Iskander-M ballistic missile and 86 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 42 drones and 26 drones were “lost” (defeated by EW). Damage was reported in Dnipro, Kharkiv and Sumy oblasts.

During the night of March 25, Russian forces launched 117 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 56 drones and 49 drones were “lost” (defeated by EW). Damage was reported in Cherkasy, Dnipropetrovsk, Kirovohrad, and Sumy oblasts.

During the night of March 24, Russian forces launched an Iskander-M ballistic missile and 139 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian air space. The UAF claimed it shot down 78 drones and 34 drones were “lost” (defeated by EW). Damage was reported in Cherkasy, Kharkiv, Kirovohrad, Kyiv, Odessa, Poltava, and Sumy oblasts.

The Ukrainian General Staff claims that the drone strikes on Engels airfield on March 19th and March 20th destroyed 96 x Kh-101 cruise missiles as well as large amount of aviation fuel.

Economic Reporting

Feb22   Jun10-22Jun8-23 Jun7 Dec9 Jan8 Feb7 Mar4 Mar25 Mar28

Brent      94.71      120.90    75.58      80.06 72.63 76.69 74.89 70.00 72.86 74.07

WTI     92.10    119.50  71.29      75.81 68.85 73.94 71.17 66.97 68.86 69.95

NG       3.97        8.41      2.15      2.82 3.17 3.66 3.37 4.44 3.84 3.89

Wheat     8.52       10.71    6.17       6.40 5.59 5.37 5.86 5.37 5.42 5.23

Ruble     85        58.48    82.59      88.77 100.84 105.18 96.88 89.50 84.56 83.92

Hryvnia Pre Oct 2023 - 36.4 41.55 42.33 41.46 41.40 41.62 41.51

Urals 56.56    67.61 66.19 71.76 68.32 65.49 65.49 65.49

ESPO 77 78.19 ??? 71.50 74.36 75.57

Sokol 65.32 72.79 70.92 67.20 69.71 70.68

Thoughts 

It seems to me, from 5,000 in the rear, that both Moscow and Kyiv are taking their time working out “technical” issues and, if I were to be cynical, they don't want a ceasefire. And while it seems roughly evenly matched, the Zelenskyy government is, I suspect, being a bit more recalcitrant than the Putin government.

The fact that the EU and several key NATO figures are digging in their heels on sanctions seems interesting; Russia is winning the war on the ground. There needs to be some incentive to induce the Russians to stop fighting. These objections would make sense if they were counter to the EU Peace Plan. Or the comprehensive EU strategy for victory. But there is no EU Peace Plan, nor is there any strategy for victory. One might almost suggest that the EU simply wants to make sure that President Trump doesn’t bring peace to Ukraine. But no one would be that cynical…

Zelenskyy has also stated that Russia is preparing to attack into Sumy oblast and that Putin is delaying so that the Russian army can begin the threat into Sumy.

While this is possible, the Russian army is in no position to conduct any sort of large-scale attack into Sumy. They would need to bring up more forces and there is nothing to suggest that they are interested in doing so. And pressing deeper into the Sumy area than perhaps 8 - 10 miles would be very difficult as Russian forces would need to fight their way through a dense forest - which slowed them to a crawl 3 years ago.

At the same time, it’s of note that the Ukrainians made several well executed counter-attacks in the last week, at several spots long the front; battalion sized efforts that clearly took advantage of the Russian army’s ponderous pace.

But that, of course, has been the whole point of the Russian war of attrition since the summer of 2022; disregarding the Russian overextension west of the Dnepr River in 2022, that was later cut off, and the poor disposition of forces in the Kharkiv area in 2022-2023, the Russian “way of war” has been slow, deliberate and low risk; and focused on inflicting casualties, and only secondarily on taking land. And so, the Ukrainians make an attack, and the Russians respond slowly and ponderously, but then grind forward and roll over or push back the Ukrainian force. And that is what they have done at several spots along the front line in the last week, spots where two weeks ago the Ukrainians made well executed attacks that regained small pieces of land and looked to be tactically sharp - they were, but they didn’t really affect the Russian effort.

South Korean reporting now suggests that the North Korean troops deployed into Kursk (11,000 - 12,000 troops) suffered 4,000 casualties in not quite 4 months of fighting (roughly 1,000 KIA and 3,000 WIA).

Recall that the Koreans suffered substantial numbers of casualties in their first few weeks as they attempted to attack in “large” units - company and battalion suited elements - that were easily detected and then struck with artillery.  Casualties dropped off considerably as they switched to first platoon and then squad sized movements.

v/r pete