BATTLE CLIPS

1. Trench battle near Kharkiv
2. Russian filming as vehicle is struck by drone
3. Captured barn tank
4. Drone hits tank with soldiers riding on top
5. Another
6. Ukrainian air force bombs Russians outside of Kharkiv where they are allegedly surrounded
7. Drone delivers drone
8. Interview from commander of Bradley that took out BTR in close combat







MAJOR BATTLEFRONTS

1. GOOD READ The time article "‘This is like Gallipoli’: inside Ukraine’s hardest battle yet"

https://www.thetimes.com/article/87d...cf10927d1d7968



RUSSIAN RECRUITMENT AND UKRAINE RECRUITMENT

1. Sri Lanka complaining about citizens being duped into joining Russian military
2. BBC article "Conscription squads send Ukrainian men into hiding"










RUSSIAN ECONOMY AND UKRAINE ECONOMY

1. Meduza article "Russia’s largest stock exchange has stopped trading in U.S. dollars and euros. What does this mean for the ruble?"
2. Bloomberg article "G-7 Agree How to Tap Frozen Russian Assets for $50B to Ukraine"
3. Inflation adjusted wages in Russia








MILITARY AID

1. USA self audit reveals DoD overcharged Ukraine 2 billion
2. WAPO article 'Biden, Zelensky to sign 10-year U.S.-Ukraine security deal at G-7 summit'

BATTLE CLIPS AND ANALYSIS

1. TOS or glide bomb strikes in Vovchansk
2. Ukrainian small diameter bomb strikes near Vovchansk
3. Russian UAV hits Ukrainian Baba Yaga
4. New Russian drone which is doing a lot of damage
5. GOOD READ Analysis of Ukraine using FPVs to destroy Russian fixed wing drones (video in the comments)
6. Trench warfare near Kharkiv
7. Drone dropping bombs from 200m
8. Glide bomb strike









PEACE

1. Putin's ultimatum for a ceasefire which includes giving up areas Russia does not control, no NATO, and lifting all sanctions
2. GREAT READ "STOLYPIN: West needs to talk seriously about Ukraine"







RECRUITMENT

1. GREAT READ rferl article "For Some In Russia's Far-Flung Provinces, Ukraine War Is A Ticket To Prosperity"
2. Somali mercenary discussing why he joined Russia








WAR CRIMES

1. ft article "FT investigation finds Ukrainian children on Russian adoption sites" (seems like a dead link now, here's the archive: https://archive.is/OAULL)
2. Russia hits residential building in Kharkiv, propagandists claim they were trying to strike a nearby hospital instead






MILITARY AID

1. Politico article "US says Ukraine can hit inside Russia ‘anywhere’ its forces attack across the border"

2. Yonhap article "S. Korea's level of arms supply to Ukraine hinges on Russia's actions: presidential office"
3. ft article "US to redirect Patriot air defence orders to Ukraine"





NORTH KOREA

1. Putin threatens South Korea






EU

1. Zelenskyy on EU membership

BATTLE CLIPS AND ANALYSIS

1. 3000kg glide kit bomb and Fighterbomber's thoughts on it as well as EW
2. 3000kg bomb
3. ATACMS launch




WAR CRIMES

1. BBC article "ICC issues arrest warrants for Russian officials"
2. Gas grenades dropped followed by FPVs





UKRAINE STRIKE CAMPAIGN

1. Ukraine strikes Russian space tracking center
2. Ukraine missile is intercepted in Crimea and kills Russian tourists.
3. Lower yellow circle is the Russian naval base. Upper yellow circle is an airfield. Red circle is where Russians are told they can vacation.
4. Reuters article "Russia promises retaliation against US for Ukraine strike on Crimea" (all over Russian propaganda they are saying this USA's fault)







RECRUITMENT

1. GREAT READ A look at what is offered to Russian recruits





EU

1. Ukraine and Moldova formally begin accession talks with EU







HYBRID WARFARE

1. WSJ article "Russian Saboteurs Behind Arson Attack at German Factory"

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/rus...9ym2ysxskw1unb

A month ago you wrote that Russia's advantages are compounding, do you still feel that way?

Yes. They are able to gain ground incrementally due to Ukraine's diminishing manpower while Russia is able to keep up pressure.

AD is lacking while Russia's missile production is increasing and they are able to find more and more gaps.

The trend is moving in Russia's favor, they are producing more equipment and troops, but sometime next year that's likely to stop.

If Ukraine can reconfigure their training system that will help. If Ukraine's allies can produce more then the equipment advantage could change sooner too.






Is the training being provided for Ukraine insufficient, and is this causing fewer volunteers?

Ukraine's force regeneration strategy is different from NATO's. Ukrainians receive basic training quickly, this consists only of physical training, and recruits are then sent to their unit. NATO teaches tactical training during basic.

When NATO trainers say that training is inadequate it is usually with this framework in mind, where they expect soldiers to exit basic with tactical training.

The western training is very relevant. Some of the criticisms are political in nature: if a Ukrainian were to die during training in a western country due to live ammo exercises then it would be a mess. Ukrainian trainers see this and say it's not relevant which is not true. They do get this training in Ukraine but the rate of accidents is much higher.

Western trainers do not have engagement with the brigade commander that they need. This does result in some training where the brigade commander does not understand the drills his new recruits have done or the training doesn't prepare them to align with how the unit operates.

The West struggles to understand the scale of fighting with 500k troops. It takes a lot of time to send recruits to the west, train them, and send them back. It's also not feasible to have them train with their equipment since it's needed in Ukraine. Training in Ukraine helps with this.








Russia's rate of loss for both soldiers and equipment doesn't seem sustainable


A lot of casualty numbers aren't accurate. When they are accurate there's also often a lack of nuance: for example 85% of Wagner casualties had a few weeks of training. Casualties of trained soldiers were around 20-40 a week, this did not degrade Russia's armed forces. Russia's troop levels have expanded during the conflict. They invaded with 150k troops, with levies in DPR and LPR raising this to 200k or so. They are now at around 510k troops despite their losses. They are still surpassing their recruitment goals.

Where they've felt the losses more is with officers which prevents Russia from scaling or performing anything advanced.

Equipment losses are such that they can sustain what they're doing this year. Next year they will begin running into problems. Russia can still inflict a lot of damage until then.

Russia will never be in a position where they can't regenerate enough vehicles. Russia is currently manufacturing per year the amount of tanks that UK will purchase in the next decade. This is 15% of what they field, the rest is refurbished. When they run out of what they can refurbish this will go up. This is significantly less than what they're using now and will constrain them, but this kicks in late 2025, early 2026. If the conflict is frozen before then then it's not going to be a major issue.

This year they will produce 150-200 tanks and refurbish 1300 or so. They can also recover a lot of claimed losses which aren't catastrophic.

## What is the theory of victory for Ukraine?

Bring about a lasting peace.

Ukraine must have security guarantees, currently countries aren't saying what they're willing to do. This means Ukraine does not have a strong position to freeze the conflict and keep it frozen. Once Ukraine is confident in this then they can begin thinking about what they need as far as territory to remain viable economically.

After that they need to consider how to convince Russia to agree to peace. Russia thinks they can win, and is not interested in any concessions currently. Long term Russia is building up a lot of problems so they might reconsider. This will eventually become an issue of who has more leverage.

Since Ukraine doesn't have these important things, Russia is only interested in a ceasefire in an attempt to isolate Ukraine from its partners. Since Ukraine doesn't know what the west is willing to offer for several key things, it's difficult for Ukraine to formulate a theory of victory.

Once there's a publicly fixed plan, Russia can then manipulate that and also make that goal as costly as possible. This is what happened in Bakhmut.

(Kind of an aside) NATO is anticipating the need to deter Russia conventionally before the end of the decade. Sending aid to Ukraine doesn't really harm this as production is increasing due to Ukraine and this will eventually help NATO's depleted arms.

Russians are in a position where they see the downsides of war, but they also don't see a better solution so things will continue on.




Kharkiv

Russia massed 40k troops but didn't send them all. Since they still hold reserves they can use them elsewhere.

Depopulating Kharkiv would have been devastating, Russia did not succeed. They did succeed at pulling in Ukrainian reserves. Russia is continuing to make progress in the south.

Ukrainian counterattacks have been effective, and they've gotten permission to strike over the border.

It's hard to rate this as a win or loss at this moment.





Will mobilization improve the situation?

Three manpower problems:

1. battlefield replacements and bringing units back to strength
2. forming new units
3. regenerating offensive combat power

There's an immediate shortage. Replacements that help the first issue will be worse trained than the rest of their unit and will not have much offensive potential. The risk Ukraine runs now is that the immediate need to solve the first issue hurts Ukraine's ability to fix the second and third issue.





The rest of 2024

Aid package has bought time, but things are still bleak.

Production needs to increase, as well as solving supply chain issues.

Training and force generation need to improve.

We risk repeating the previous errors committed: talking a lot and waiting to long to actually implement.

Decisions need to be made this summer, as soon as possible