May 21st, 2025

Politics - Meloni Confirms Vatican offer

- Rubio waiting for Russian peace plan

Combat Ops  - Summer Offensive has begun???

Politics and Diplomacy

Italy’s Prime Minister Meloni confirmed that Pope Leo has offered the Vatican as a site for peace talks between Ukraine and Russia.

SecState Rubio expects Russia to provide a peace plan in the near term. He expects:

“Just broad terms that would allow us to move towards a ceasefire, and that ceasefire would then allow us to enter into detailed negotiations to bring about an end of the conflict.”

Andriy Portnov, once aide to former Ukrainian President Yanukovich, was shot and killed in Madrid this morning. Portnov was shot 5 times, with three wounds in his head and chest. The gunmen are still at large. 

Portnov was sanctioned by the US for corruption.

Ground Operations 

Russian forces had confirmed gains in several areas along the front, as they continue to grind forward, to include gains in Sumy oblast, the probable elimination of the final Ukrainian lodgments in Kursk and Belgorod oblasts, gains in the Lyman area north of the Donets River, consistent gains in the area bounded by Pokrovsk - Toretsk - Kostiantinivka, and gains north-west and west of Velyka Novosilke. These gains have led some analysts to conclude that the Russians are committing more forces to these fights and that, therefore the right conclusion is that the Russians have begun their “summer offensive.”

One source (a pro-Russian site) asserts that a reserve force of some 60,000 - 80,000 troops has been set to support operations in the Pokrovsk to Toretsk to Chasiv Yar sector and troops from this force, augmenting those already in the field, are responsible for the gains in this area, which will be the focus of this now begun summer offensive.

Reporting from the Ukrainian blogs shows the following for this area of the front: more conservative Ukrainian bloggers show Russian forces as well short of Rusyn Yar on the west fork of the envelopment, and 3 miles south-east of the Kleban Byk reservoir north-west of Toretsk. The less conservative Ukrainian bloggers show Russian forces just south of Rusyn Yar in the west and less than a mile from the reservoir in the east. These less conservative blogs show the Russian forces in the east as having cut the road into the pocket from east of the reservoir, leaving the Ukrainian forces with only two roads into the pocket, one of which runs through Romanivka, which pretty much everyone agrees the Russians now control.

Ukrainian regional governor reports that the roads that lead to Kostiantinivka from the west and northwest (the roads not already held by the Russians) are under frequent daily attack by FPV drones, and an average of 10 RuAF strikes are flown against the city daily. The city, home to almost 70,000 before the war, is now estimated to have 9,000 inhabitants; they have been told to leave.

It is worth noting that if Russian forces can collapse this pocket, it would also weaken the Ukrainian positions just west of the pocket, which are key elements of the defense of Pokrovsk. Said differently, collapsing this pocket would set up the sieges of both Pokrovsk and Kostiantinivka.

Thoughts 

Abbreviated summary today, overcome by events.

It seems probable that the Russian summer offensive has begun. European and Ukrainian reporting will continue to stress the tremendous Russian casualty rate - though it seems that the real casualty figures for Russia are on par with Ukraine’s; Russia has perhaps 120,000 KIA and 400,000 WIA, Ukraine has in excess of 80,000 KIA and 400,000 WIA as of last September, and probably in excess of 135,000 WIA and 450,000 WIA as of May 2025. And Russia has nearly five times as large a population as Ukraine.

More to the point, Russian army morale and Russian social support for the war and Putin remain high. Russian forces retain the initiative, and Russian leadership, in particular Putin, is willing to keep waging this war of attrition.

Short of a very convincing mix of carrots and stick from the West - from President Trump (the EU is not a worry to Putin) - there seems to me to be little that is going to convince Putin to end the war.

v/r pete