OCTOBER 31st, 2025

Politics - Hungary’s Orban to meet with Trump

- Russian MOD proposes brief ceasefire in Pokrovsk

Combat Ops - Russian gains near Kupyansk and Pokrovsk

- Air strikes continue

Weather

Kharkiv

52 and partly cloudy, gusting to 20. Cloudy or mostly cloudy for the next 5 days. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the 50s. Winds westerly, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

57 and partly cloudy, gusting to 20. Partly cloudy to sunny into the middle of next week. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs around 60.  Winds westerly, 5-10kts.

Kyiv

45 and cloudy, gusting over 35. Cloudy through Tuesday. Daily lows in the 40s, daily highs in the 50s. Winds westerly, 15-20kts.

Politics 

Hungary’s PM Orban will meet with President Trump in Washington, on November 7th (next Friday), to discuss arranging a US - Russia (Trump - Putin) meeting, and to discuss Hungary receiving exemptions from the current oil and gas sanctions against Russia.

Russia’s MOD has proposed a brief (6 hour) ceasefire in Prokrovsk, Myrnohrad and Kupyansk to let reporters into and then out of the cities, but nothing has been decided and this seems to be more an InfoWar - Propaganda action than anything else.

Ground Operations

SUMY AND KHARKIV OBLASTS

Fighting continues along most of the would-be Russian buffer zone north of Sumy City and imagery confirms Ukrainian forces have pushed into the small village of Kostyantinivka, on the west end of the Russian occupied terrain (on the border), and appear to control Kindrativka (a small village just south of Kostiantinivka). Kostinantinivka is a village of perhaps less than 100 people, Kindrativka had just over 1,000 people before the war started; both are now empty.

Fighting continues north of Kharkiv, but there were no confirmed changes in the front line, nor were there any changes along the border north of the Oskil River.

NORTH OF THE DONETS RIVER

Fighting continues in and around Kupyansk, but there were no confirmed changes to the front lines.

However, Russian reporting suggests significant gains (which could be unconfirmed given the poor weather (clouds and rain showers) preventing any imagery from confirming any changes to the lines).

Russian reports claim gains south of Kupyansk, to include taking the tiny village (about 10 houses) of Sadove (about 2.5 - 3 miles south of the P07 - P79 intersection in the middle of Kupaynsk, about a mile west of P79; Russian forces then reportedly pushed another mile south and have reached the town of Osynove. This would have required moving through some fairly dense woods between Kupyansk and the village; Ukrainian forces have been very competent in using these woods to slow Russian movements. Because of the distance and the terrain (the woods) it would seem unlikely this is anything other than a recon element. 

At the same time Russian sources are claiming gains west of Pishchane, pushing to the eastern edge of the town of Kupyansk Vuzlovyi (about 3 miles south of the center of Kupyansk, but on the east side of the Oskil River). This force is reportedly less than 2,000 meters from the Oskil River. 

Again, lacking any other reporting, the likelihood is that this is simply a recon element.

Fighting continued along the rest of the front lines in this area, and imagery confirmed that Ukrainian forces had gains in Novoselivka (on the Nitrius River), even as Russian recon elements probed into Lyman itself.

It is also worth noting that the various blogs following the front lines in detail now show that Russian forces are roughly 3 miles west of Serednie, placing them just 5 miles east of the Oskil River in this area; this still places them 10 miles from the nearest fixed bridge over the Oskil River, one that probably cannot support a T-72 tank.

BAKHMUT - TORETSK - POKROVSK

North-east of Bakhmut, fighting continues around Siversk, and imagery confirms that Russian forces have pushed further up the rail line just north-west of Vyimka, and are now, on this axis of attack, about 1.5 miles from Siversk.

West of Chasiv Yar and west of Toretsk, a good deal of fighting was reported but there were no changes in the lines.

Further west of Toretsk, along the road and the string of small towns from Druzhkivka to Myrnohrad, very heavy fighting continues and both sides are once again caught in a see-saw battle for portions of each town. Imagery yesterday showed Ukrainian forces pushing into terrain just east of Volodymyrivka, and there is a long list of contradictory reporting as to the front line and the entire salient north-east of Pokrovsk. The fighting appears to be quite heavy, and there are a long string of changes and a constantly evolving front line. On top of this is the constant stream of Russian recon elements probing into and through Ukrainian positions, which also serves to confuse the ground picture.

Ukrainian army commanders are reporting increased Russian recon infiltration in Pokrovsk, and imagery confirmed Russian elements moving along the rail line from the west, into central Pokrovsk.  Reporting also suggests that Russian forces now have de facto air superiority (via drones) over the city, and that all GLOCs into and out of the Pokrovsk and Myrnohrad are now being struck by Russian drones.

Further south and to the west there are reports of a good deal of fighting but there were no confirmed changes to the front lines.

SOUTHERN UKRAINE

South of the Vovcha River, Russian sources claimed a series of gains in the Oleksiivka - Verbove - Yehorviak area, and assert control over the town of Novoleksandrivka, a small farming village of perhaps 100 house. More importantly, this town is north and west of any of the Ukrainian defensive positions in the south, and accept for the very small village of Hai a half mile further west, is the last obstacle to the T0401 roadway, the furthest east of any significant north-south roads controlled by Ukrainian forces, and one of only two major roads into Hulyaipole.

Just to the south-west of Verbove, imagery showed Russian forces in taking control of the small town of Krasnohirske.

Air and Maritime Operations

During the night of October 30th-October 31st Russian forces launched at least 1 x Iskander ballistic missile and 145 x Shahed drones. The UAF report claimed it shot down or defeated by EW, 1 ballistic missile and 107 Shahed drones.

Damage was reported in Chernihiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Kyiv, Poltava, and Sumy oblasts.

Damage reported included extensive damage to the power grid; at least one ballistic missile reportedly struck Dnipro city.

Casualties reported included at least 1 dead civilian and 6 wounded civilians.

RuAF tacair struck 8 towns.

Polish Air Force (PAF) MiG-29 fighters intercepted a Russian IL-20 “COOT” reconnaissance aircraft over the Baltic on the 30th, the 2nd time in 3 days that hte Russians have flown this collection route.

The IL-20 is a 4-engine turbo-porp aircraft with an extensive electronic and signals intelligence (ELINT and SIGINT) collection capability as well as a Side Looking Radar (SLAR) used for radar imaging, and a “high resolution panoramic” camera.

During the night of October 29th-30th Russian forces launched at least 5 x Iskander ballistic missiles, 4 x Kinzhal ballistic missiles, 8 x Kalibr cruise missiles, 2 x Iskander cruise missiles, 30 x Kh-101 cruise missiles, 2 x Kh-59/69 cruise missiles, 1 x Kh-31P cruise missile, and 653 x Shahed drones. The UAF claimed it shot down or defeated by EW, 31 cruise missiles and 592 Shahed drones. Of note, they did not note defeating the Kh-31P anti-radiation cruise missile, suggesting the Russian strike may have damaged (or destroyed) a radar set of some sort.

Damage was reported in Chernihiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Ivano-Frankivsk, Khmelnitsky, Lviv, Mykolaiv, Poltava, Sumy, Ternopil, Vinnytsia, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts. Damage reported included extensive damage to the power grid; at least one ballistic missile struck Dnipro city.

Casualties reported included at least 1 dead civilian and 13 wounded civilians.

RuAF tacair struck 5 towns.

Economic Reporting

Feb22   July8 Aug8 Sep9 Oct8 Oct30 Oct31

Brent      94.71    70.44 66.90 67.03 66.18 64.89 65.20

WTI     92.10    68.65 64.29 63.26 62.48 60.52 60.98

NG       3.97         3.35 3.06 3.12 3.44 3.90 4.07

Wheat     8.52          5.49 5.18 5.22 5.06 5.21 5.17

Ruble     85          78.47 79.74 84.03 81.28 79.90 80.81

Hryvnia 28.6 41.80 41.39 41.23 41.48 41.87 41.95

Urals 91.66 64.07 63.17 60.12 61.15 57.87 57.99

ESPO 94.52 71.58 68.63 68.32 66.74 63.82 66.80

Sokol 99.31 64.38 62.57 62.97 61.91 61.16 61.17

Ukraine’s government debt reached $194.2 billion in September, on a projected 2025 GDP of $205 billion.

The GDP figure is of note: Ukraine’s GDP in 2021 was $170 billion, with 43 million people and a 400,000 man army. Today, with 31 million people, 12 million fewer people, a loss of a significant chunk of their industry, and a 1.3 million man army, the GDP is 20% larger…

Thoughts

Beyond all the InfoWar - propaganda (from both sides), as well as the contradictory nature of reporting from scenes of combat even under the best of circumstances, it’s worth considering that the advances around Kupyansk and Myrnohrad and Pokrovsk are more than recon elements and that Russian forces do control at least portions of these various towns. Given the suggestion by Putin that there be a brief ceasefire so reporters can enter these areas, the Russians may in fact be in a commanding position around these cities and are trying to bring extra pressure to bare. If that is the case, expect more Russian forces to flow into these areas in the next day or two.

Beyond that, these reports and possible advances speak to the more serious issue of lack of adequate numbers of Ukrainian infantrymen, and that lines are, indeed, “porous” as has been suggested by various reporters.

Several respected commentators have described the the front line as porous, that is, Russian recon elements are able to penetrate the line and get into these cities in more and more places, and this is consistent with other reports that the Ukrainian army, at least in these two sectors (Pokrovsk - Myrnohrad and Kupyansk), has fewer and fewer trained foot soldiers and units are being plussed up with personnel from the rear who are being pulled forward and rushed into infantry units without formal infantry training.

The situation appears to be changing rapidly. Several Russian blogger reports suggest that Ukrainian units (roughly 4 - 5 brigades, but perhaps 10,000 troops) remaining in the pocket east of Pokrovsk (centered on Myrnohrad) have begun to slowly withdraw while they keep the mouth of the pocket open. Ukrainian blogs map out the pocket with a mouth almost 5 miles wide, Russian blogs suggest only 3 miles wide. Either way, the gap is decreasing.

But, if the Ukrainians are beginning to withdraw, this is an unusual event. The rule has been that the Ukrainian General Staff keeps forces inside these pockets long after others might have withdrawn, resulting in long, bloody fights that devolve to house to house fights and high casualty rates on both sides, and that withdrawals are truly “last minute, by the narrowest of margins” events.

However, if, as some reporting suggests, the Russians have already moved some 3 or 4 more brigades into the attack on the pocket, and at the same time the anecdotal reports of lack of infantryman and a “porous” line are correct, withdrawal may be the only option. If they are withdrawing, the pocket should collapse fairly quickly, probably in the next week to 10 days. Lots of “ifs,” but the situation appears to be evolving quickly.

v/r pete