June 8th, 2026

Politics - Drone shot down over Latvia

Combat Ops - Breakthrough in the South?

- Air Strikes Continue

Weather

Kharkiv

73 and cloudy, some rain showers. Partly cloudy Tuesday through Thursday, then 5 days of thunderstorms. Daily lows around 60, daily highs in the mid 80s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Melitopol

77 and rain showers, gusts over 20. Rain showers and thunderstorms possible very day this week. Daily lows around 60, daily highs in the mid 80s. Winds variable, 5-10kts.

Kyiv

73 and rain. Tomorrow more rain and cooler (high of 70), then partly cloudy through Friday, scattered thunderstorms as well on Friday. Daily lows near 60, after Tuesday daily highs around 80. Winds north-westerly, 5-10kts.

Politics

A NATO alert, in this case French AF Rafael launching out of Siauliai AB in Lithuania, shot down a drone over Latvia this morning. The report does not note whose drone it was, but inferred it was a Ukrainian drown, stating that the drone “had flown into Latvia as a result of Russian electromagnetic warfare.”

Ground Operations

Overall, ground operations along the front showed few changes over the past 4 days. That said, there is a piece of grand dissonance in the reporting of the war, discussed in detail below in my thoughts.

Along the front lines infiltrations continue by both sides. Heavy fighting continues in the general arc east and north-east of Slovyansk; over the past several days there were small Russian gains east of Slovyansk, and small Ukrainian gains north-east of Slovyansk. Imagery confirms Ukrainian positions on the west edge of Rodynske (north of Pokrovsk). Further south, Russian infiltrations continue in Kostyantinvka, and both sides made small gains north-west of Hulyaipole and south-east of Verbove.

Russian forces also continued infiltrations into the area south of Charivne (south-west of Hulyaipole. And Ukrainian forces have retaken terrain immediately south of Novodanylivka (immediately south of Orikhiv).

At the same time, Ukrainian drones continue to strike Russian logistics lines both in the center, particularly in the Bakhmut area, and in the south, hitting the ground lines of communication (GLOCs) that run from Berdyansk and Mariupol to the front lines.

Clearly, these strikes are damaging the logistics support to forward forces but there is no public data that allows an assessment of the impact of these strikes - and the same can be said of Russian strikes on Ukrainian GLOCs.

There are also reports of gas lines at gas stations in Crimea as a result of these various drone strikes and there are reports of shortages on buckwheat, sugar, rice and flour.

Gas prices in Crimea are regulated; 92 Octane has risen from 71 rubles per liter in June of 2025 ($3.44 per gallon), to 75 rubles per liter in early May, 80 rubles per liter a week ago, and right now around 82 rubles per liter ($4.14 per gallon). But rationing is also in effect, limited to 20 liters per car, and black market prices are anywhere from 200 - 350 rubles per liter ($10.35 - $18.12 per gallon)

Air and Maritime Operations

During the period May 31st - June 6th Russian forces launched into Ukrainian air space 88 missiles (ballistic and cruise), more than 3,250 strike drones, and 1,800 glide bombs. 

During the night of June 7th-June 8th Russian forces launched strikes into Ukrainian airspace, with at least 155 x strike drones. The UAF claimed it shot down, or defeated with EW, 124 drones.

Damage was reported in Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, Odessa, Sumy, Zaporizhzhia oblasts. 

Targets included the power grid and transportation infrastructure.

There were at least 4 civilian killed and 32 wounded in strikes.

RuAF tacair struck at least 10 Ukrainian towns.

During the period of June 3rd-June 7th Russian strikes into Ukrainian airspace included at least 1 x Iskander ballistic missile, 2 x cruise missiles and 1,117 x strike drones. The UAF claimed it shot down, or defeated with EW, 926 drones.

Russian reporting on Ukrainian drone operations is not as consistent as Ukrainian reporting on Russian dozens but Russian sources claimed on Saturday that during the night of June 5th-6th Russian forces shot down 376 Ukrainian drones. There was no comment on how many got through Russian air defenses.

Economic Reporting

Feb22  Feb9 Mar9 Apr8 May8 Jun4 Jun8

Brent      94.71   68.57 106.40 91.78 100.50 94.66 93.82

WTI     92.10   64.04 103.60 93.53 94.91 92.68 90.59

NG       3.97      3.20 3.37 2.73 2.79 3.31 3.14

Wheat     8.52  5.29 6.25 5.79 6.14 5.86 5.82

Ruble     85          77.40 78.20 78.54 74.26 73.66 73.10

Hryvnia 28.6 43.03 43.93 43.45 43.90 44.35 44.64

Urals 91.66 56.37 90.97 124.85 92.56 88.72 86.33

ESPO 94.52 59.77 84.99 103.27 105.56 98.64 95.51

Sokol 99.31 62.85 101.55 96.88 95.96 90.62 89.90

Thoughts

Gen. Hodges has commented that Ukrainian forces in the south have broken through and that the Russian southern front is collapsing. It is a "140 km wide collapse” [87 miles]. Looking at that statement and placing it on a map - Hodges doesn’t display a map in any of these pod casts, 140 KM (87 miles) is the distance from the Dnepr River, following the twists and turns of the front line eastward across southern Ukraine to a point just a few miles southwest of Hulyaipole. In short, the whole southern front.

Hodges commented that “Russia’s entire southern front has collapsed,” that the Russian prepared defenses have been "penetrated bypassed or abandoned” and that given the placement of Russian reserves, the positions are “unrecoverable.” Russian forces are now executing a “retrograde defense” but are, he offered, ill equipped to do so, due to poor training and high losses.

This is “not simply of tactical or operational significance, it is a strategic development that changes the strategic picture of this conflict.”

There are, apparently, 80,000 Russian troops threatened by this break through. Per Hodges:

- 30,000 troops [roughly 10 brigades / regiments - maybe more depending on manning] in forward positions that are now functionally encircled — cut off from resupply, cut off from from command connectivity, and this terrain Ukrainian forces are moving around rather than assaulting - leaving them to “whither."

- 35,000 [roughly 12 brigades] in rear area positions that were the original targets of the Ukrainian exploitation and are now under direct Ukrainian fires - Ukrainian forces have penetrated terrain either side of these units are attempting to flank them - but these forces have not been encircled.

- 15,000 [roughly 5 brigades] reserve forces too far to the east to support the retrograde movement.

So, 22 brigades (or more) directly at risk per this discussion, and 5 more nearby to the west, so says Hodges report.

Yet, on the Deep State map - perhaps the most authoritative civilian map coming out of Kyiv, there are only 17 brigades between Ernohodar (the Zaporizhia Nuclear Power Plant) and Hulyaipole - a distance of perhaps 300 KM (180 miles). Further, the most generous placement of the Ukrainian forward edge of troops - outside of Gen Hodges discussion, places the Ukrainian line - as of Sunday - about 4 miles north of the nearest finished Russian defensive line at one point south-east of Orikhiv. At every other point it is further away.

What does all this mean? I don’t know. It may well be that the rest of these data feeds that we have all been reading for the last 4+ years have all been so falsified that we can know nothing by looking at the maps or listening to the reports and whether Gen. Hodges is right or not we will only learn in time.

It may be that Gen. Hodges has been snookered by a propaganda effort coming out of Kyiv.

It may be that Gen. Hodges is actively participating in an information warfare effort to convince Putin that his army is losing badly and that none of his generals are to be trusted in any way.

What I know is that none of the half dozen sites I visit daily, which all have demonstrated a fair degree of rigorous analysis, do not show a break-through, or a collapse, and in fact do not show any of the necessary supporting information that would support that sort of assessment. 

I’d like to see Hodges story be shown to be correct, that we are seeing a “development that changes the strategic picture of this conflict.” 

But, from what I can find, that’s not how I’d bet.

v/r pete