June 6th, 2025 1944 - D-Day landings

1942 - Battle of Midway (through 07 June)

Slightly abbreviated summaries today

 

Politics - President Trump critical of strikes

- White House nominates USAF officer for SACEUR post

Combat Ops - Small Russian gains in the center

- Drones over Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant 

Politics and Diplomacy

The Atlantic is reporting that President Trump was critical of the Ukrainian strike on Russian bombers and considers it an escalation of the war and something that will significantly “complicate negotiations.”

Anonymous sources (the only kind I suppose) report that Trump called President Zelenskyy a “hothead” who is leading the world into a World War.

Trump commented to reporters on the issue of more sanctions on Russia:

“When I see the moment where it’s not going to stop … we’ll be very, very, very tough. And it could be on both countries, to be honest. You know, it takes two to tango.”

Trump also commented that he had asked Putin to not retaliate for Sunday’s attack.

The White House announced the nomination of USAF LTGEN Alexus Grynkewich as COMEUCOM and SACEUR.  Grynkevish is currently the Joint Staff Ops boss (J3) and previously was commander of 9th AF (CENTCOM’s Air Component). He is an F-16 pilot and was at one point chief of the F-22 OPEVAL team.

Slovakia’s Parliament passed (51 to 25) a resolution yesterday that “urged” the government to oppose any further sanctions on Russia and to “defend national interest.” Slovakian fuel prices have risen sharply since the EU placed sanctions against Russia and the sanctions generally are viewed as having hurt the Slovakian economy.

NATO /  EU armaments support to Ukraine:

The Netherlands will provide 400 million euros ($456 million) of aid to Ukraine, consisting of 100 small boats, 50 naval drones , small arms, sensors, spare parts and training.

Luxembourg promised to increase military aid to Ukraine 50% by the end of the year.

Belgium has promised to provide 1.1 billion euros ($1.25 billion) per year through 2029, and will also give Ukraine a mine sweeper (ship). 

Canada has promised $45 million for drones, electronic warfare gear, and a number of armored personnel carriers.

Norway will provide $7 billion of aid this year, including $700 million for drones, with primary focus being Ukraine’s defense industrial base.

Ground Operations 

In the Russian center - between Bakhmut and Pokrovsk, especially between Toretsk and the T0504 roadway, Russian forces continue to gain ground. Yesterday Russian forces pushed further into the western end of Yablunivka, and just west of the roadway, Russian forces were engaged with Ukrainian forces just south of Rusyn Yar. Russian forces made incremental gains just north of Toretsk, as well as at several more sites east of Pokrovsk.

Ukrainian forces report that the Russian forces in this general area are using a great many fiber optic FPV (First Person Video) drones and that Ukrainian forces are having difficulty holding terrain because of it. Ukrainian forces claim that Russian forces in the Toretsk area alone used 7,000 FPV drones in April and 10,000 in May.

There were claims of minor gains by Ukrainian forces along the border north-west of Sumy City, but these are unconfirmed and elsewhere in the Sumy Oblast area, and north of Kharkiv, there were no changes in the front line.

North of Kupyansk, Russian forces pushed into Kindrashivka (west of the Oskil river), pushing further south on the P-79 roadway.

Further south, between Terny and Karpivka, Russian forces have pushed south into Zelena Dolyna.

Across Southern Ukraine Ukrainian forces had small gains in the Myrne area.

Air Operations

This morning IAEA personnel at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant reported gunfire which turned out to be Russian troops shooting at drones attacking the site’s training center. Five explosions were heard but there was no reported damage to any of the reactors or supporting equipment.

During the night of  June 5th-June 6th Russian forces launched least 6 x Iskander ballistic missile, 36 x Kh-101 cruise missiles, 2 x Iskander cruise missiles, 1 x Kh-31P cruise missiles and 407 x Shahed drones into Ukrainian airspace. The UAF claimed it shot down 4 ballistic missiles, 32 cruise missiles, and 199 drones, and 169 drones were “lost” (brought down by EW). In addition, they reported that 2 ballistic missiles "crashed." Damage was reported in Chernihiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Khmelnytskyi, Kyiv, Lviv, Odessa, Poltava, Ternopil, and Zaporizhzhia Oblast. More than 2,100 houses in Kyiv were left in the dark as a result of the strike.

RuAF tacair struck 18 Ukrainian towns again last night.

During the night of  June 4th-June 5th Russian forces launched least 1 x Iskander ballistic missile, 103 x Shahed drones and 2 x Kh-35 cruise missiles  into Ukrainian airspace. The UAF claimed it shot down 28 drones, and 46 were “lost” (brought down by EW). Damage was reported in Chernihiv, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts (reports not complete at this time).

RuAF tacair struck 18 Ukrainian towns again last night. The Ukrainian government reports that the main administrative building of the Kherson oblast was struck by 2 glide bombs on the 5th and has been destroyed.

Ukrainian forces struck at 3 x Iskander launchers north of Ukraine, in the Bryansk area. Current damage assessment is that 1 x launcher was destroyed and 2 were damaged. The short video that has been released (taken by a drone) appears to show a missile striking a launcher. On-line pundits suggest it was an ATACMS strike but this has not been confirmed.

The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian drones struck Engels and Dyagilevo airfields last night and the fuel depot at Engels is reported to be on fire. The Mayor of Moscow reported that 10 drones were shot down in the vicinity of the city. 

President Zelenskyy stated that Russian forces have used 17,700 glide bombs, 11,200 Shahed drones, 9,000 other strike drones and 700 missiles in strikes on Ukraine, since the start of the year.

Special Operations - Spider’s Web

No New Damage Estimates.

Thoughts 

Pontifications on the impact of the strikes continue to proliferate, pretty much covering the entire spectrum from: “this proves Russia can’t win” to “this is a last gasp and Ukraine is about to fall.”

At the same time, it appears that President Trump is reaching a point of frustration with the entire situation.

There is, of course, an argument that the US has no enduring national interest in this fight, that, after all, Ukraine was of no individual interest to the US until 1991. Prior to that it was one of many Soviet Socialist Republics, and only became “of interest” once it was independent and found itself in possession of 1600 nuclear weapons.

The counter to that, of course, is that the US IS involved and, having committed ourselves to support it, we must not let it fail, accompanied by echoes of Vietnam, Afghanistan, etc.

The counter to that is that the US has other, greater, interests in Asia, in which we have much greater investments and much more at stake, and at the same time Europe has, at least on paper, for more than enough to handle the problem, with a population 3 times the size of Russia’s and a collective GDP 8 times that of Russia, as well as two nations with nuclear weapons.

Yet, France, Germany, Ukraine and the UK all insist the US is critical to any future solution.

It would seem that at some point Trump is going to need to say which theater gets first call on the assets. My own take on it is that this entire strategic calculus cannot be solved with conventional assets, that Eisenhower was right, and that deterrence requires theater nuclear forces. And therefore, we need to forward deploy theater nuclear assets to the western Pacific.

v/r pete