The Kharkiv area is more or less status quo. There is fighting along the line and artillery fire both inside the city and around pretty much every settlement along the line.
South east of Kharkiv, closer to Izyum, Russia performed recon overnight and into the morning near Husarivka (1) and then during the day they attacked the town (2). The attack was repelled.
South of Izyum, I am steadily growing my area of uncertainty around Bohorodychne. It could be true that Ukraine controls Pasika, but I have not seen confirmation. Each passing day without news of Russian movement I have expanded by uncertainty towards of Pasika.
Ukrainian defenders repelled an attack on Dmytrivka (3) and destroyed a Russian sabotage group near Dolyna (4). This area is very quite ever since Russia withdrew most of their forces.
Ukraine could end up liberating most of these towns in the coming weeks. I suspect Ukraine could push Russia back to the river, and Russia may try to hold a bridgehead in Izyum itself (A) if not further south in Topolske, Donetske, and Kamyanka (B).
(I made Russian controlled area south of the River purple for the purpose of this image, to make it more obvious where the river is).
In the Siversk area, Russia and Ukraine are conducting artillery duels, but there hasn't been much movement. Today, Russian recon were spotted near Serebrianka (5) and driven away.
Russia plans to capture Bakhmut, but it has been heavily fortified with concrete bunkers, trenches, and tunnel systems. Before Bakhmut, they must first fight through Yakovlivka (6), Soledar (7), Bakhmutske (8), Pokrovske (9), Vesela Dolyna (10), Vershyna (11), and Zaitseve.
There is heavy fighting all along this line. Russia is struggling to completely capture Pokrovske (9), and the same is likely true in Vershyna (11), although it is possible I have exaggerated the extent of their success in the latter case.
There is ongoing fighting in Semyhirya (12), where I believe Ukraine is performing a fighting withdrawal towards Kodema in an effort to slow Russian forces as engineers work to build more defenses.
In the Donetsk area, Russia wants to capture Avdiivka, and they are making a concerted effort to capture the city. The forces in this area are low on infantry, and the defenses around Avdiivka are extremely deep and well developed.
There are many, many lines of defense that Russia will have to push through to capture this area. Today, Russia attacked Kamyanka, but the attack was destroyed by artillery (13).
Russians apparently took some ground around Avdiivka (14), but I couldn't find information about it and I mapped it arbitrarily. I will update it to be more accurate if I can find more information.
Russia attacked Pisky from two angles (15,16) and both attacks were repelled.
The Zaporizhzhia area has been marked by artillery duels dating back many weeks. Ukraine has had an advantage in quality, while Russia has had an advantage in quantity.
In the long run, Ukrainian artillery have been gradually grinding down Russian artillery, and now their artillery has been weakened to the extent that Ukraine has been able to capture some land (C,D,E,F).
Today, Russia launched counter attacks towards Dorozhnyanka (17) which shows that my belief that Ukraine had captured Kostyantynivka was incorrect. The attack was repelled. Russia tried to drive Ukrainian forces out of Inzhenerne (18), but they failed.
Nesterianka (19) is contested and there is ongoing fighting. A Russian counter attack towards Shcherbaky (20) was repelled. Ukrainian forces are trying to move south to capture Konovalova.
A bit further south, on the 29th Ukraine launched missile strikes, probably HIMARS, into Russian strongholds near Novopoltavka and Verkhnii Tokmak in the Chernihivka area.
Today there are reports that Russian forces have withdrawn the bulk of their forces in these two towns and moved them in the directions of Berdyansk (21) and Tokmak (22). Ukrainian sources claim fewer than 100 Russians remain in each of these two strongholds.
Russians claim these movements are part of a rotation and that these forces will be replaced.
In Kakhovka, a video came out showing how a Russian collaborator was wounded by a bomb (23).
The collaborator, Yefimenko Vitaly, also known as Yukhym, is infamous for his promise to massacre all pro-Ukrainian residents in Kherson oblast. Reportedly, his car was armored, which may have saved his life.
Russian forces are repairing the Antonovskiy Bridge by laying large slabs of concrete on top of the holes through the driving surface (24). Something tells me this temporary solution will be exceptionally temporary.
Ukrainian forces reportedly struck a Russian train with HIMARS in Brylivka (25), dealing tremendous damage to both material and personnel. I read that all of the engineers and mechanics on the train were killed, along with perhaps 3 dozen other vehicles.
Ukrainian long range rockets, likely HIMARS, also struck an ammunition warehouse in Skadovsk (26). Reportedly, Ukraine watched Russians unload supplies into this warehouse for several days before deciding to destroy it. After all, you need to maximize the bang for your buck.
I want to start by saying I don’t have access to official documents or meetings, so I’m piecing together their motivations based on what I observe and logical reasoning. Keep that in mind as you read on.
This year, Russia's goals are threefold. First, to capture the eastern bank of the Dnipro River. Second, to capture Kostyantynivka. Third, to capture Slovyansk.
Each of these goals has necessary steps. To capture the bank in Zaporizhzhia, you must first capture Orikhiv. To capture Slovyansk, you must first capture Lyman. You could argue that to capture Kostyantynivka, you must first capture Chasiv Yar.
These goals are very ambitious and, honestly, impossible to fully achieve. So let’s think of them as aspirations and focus instead on how close Russia might get to reaching them.
Ukraine launched several counterattacks in the Verbove and Ternove areas of Zaporizhzhia. They were quite successful, pushing Russia out of several settlements and possibly capturing some. This also threatened Russia’s main supply route to the west. Because of this, Russia has to do two things: divert resources from their main attack to stabilize the area and try to recapture this ground to keep pushing west toward Orikhiv. Meanwhile, Ukraine gains time to strengthen defenses, plan their strategy, and prepare for more counterattacks, something Russia worries about given their timeline.
This has already delayed Russia’s offensive by months, and it will take many more weeks for them to regain their previous position.
Recently, Russia tried an armored assault on Orikhiv, which failed badly (A). They also tried to advance through Mala Tokmachka (B) before, but that failed too. A direct attack on Orikhiv is unlikely to succeed without heavy losses, so Russia wants to avoid it unless they have no choice. Still, based on past experience, they might end up having to take the town this way.
The military analysis of Iran has been the absolute worst military analysis I have ever seen in my entire life.
There have been times where I listen to some "expert" where almost every word they say in the entire interview is factually wrong. Some of these people are so wrong that I feel like you could have a big box of words and reach in and draw them randomly and it be more factual.
To prove my point, I just asked a LLM to analyze the form of a normal military interview on cable news and using strictly randomly generated words and no access to the actual news please give me a report on what's going on in Ian (unironically, this is what LLMs are good at, probably, just lying about shit):::
From an operational standpoint, the expanding American strike corridor may complicate Iran’s layered coastal defenses, which could scatter missile batteries inland.
At the tactical level, the Iranian drone screen might disrupt a forward U.S. maneuver package, which could stall momentum along the maritime axis.
From the broader battlefield geometry, the concentrated American carrier posture may pressure Iran’s southern command network, which could trigger rapid repositioning of defensive units.
Right now on the ground, the reinforced Iranian coastal belt might absorb the initial U.S. probing attacks, which could slow the opening phase of the campaign.
The main thing that any educated person needs to keep in mind at all times is that realpolitik is fake and everyone who believes in it is typically universally wrong on every single word they ever say.
It is especially funny because realpolitik people are almost never experts in any domain, and they get their info from aggregators. And those aggregators know the realpolitik people use them, and as such present info in a way most likely to influence the realpolitik.
They end up just being unwitting amplifiers of misinformation.
Frankly I think the fastest way to end the war in Ukraine is not by sending tanks or by idiotic peace proposals. The fastest way is to set up factories across europe to produce 1000-2000 long range strike drones per day, and launch hundreds if not thousands of drones into Russia every single day until the country collapses. If they think sending 500 drones into Ukraine is a threat, see how they respond when 3000 drones fly into Russia.
With this many drones you can hammer every single factory, powerplant, substation, oil refinery, and mine in russia relentlessly.
Europe had a million drone program, to supply 1 million fpv drones. Fuck fpv drones. Have a 1 million drone program to supply 1 million strike drones. That's your million drones.
The "stupid westerners, sanctions do not work, we smuggle goods in illegally. muahaha, Russia unstoppable" people tickle me. Sanctions are not for stopping goods entirely, they are for increasing friction because the resources you spend smuggling are resources not spent growing
People fundamentally don't understand the purpose of a sanction. Sanctions are not to stop the war now, although they do damage Russia, the real goal of a sanction is long term economic damage to permanently shrink their economic growth on the timescale of decades.
The sanction is basically saying "okay, you're a threat to me today, and maybe I can't do much about it now, but I will shrink you and outgrow you so in 50-100 years you are no longer a threat to me at all". It is a long term play.
The Russians claim they shoot down Ukrainian aircraft the moment the missile leaves the tube, but we're supposed to believe they shot down two Black Hawks on Tuesday and only announced it after Ukraine leaked Black Hawk footage on Friday. These Black Hawks join the 650 F-16s and 450,000 M777s Russia has 'destroyed.'
GUYS. I AM GOING TO POST A VIDEO WHERE I WILL BLUR THE UNIT LOGOS TO SHIT SO NOBODY CAN TELL I STOLE THE VIDEOS FROM THE ARCHIVE AND THEN POST IT TO THE INTERNET SAYING I KILLED ALL THE SPECIAL FORCES
And then media outlets and super smart think tank people all over the world will believe me for some reason and then everyone will be like omg all the special forces died.