Despite the Kursk offensive, Russian troops are continuing to focus on the Donbas, and particularlyn on the prized city of Pokrovsk. They closed the gap by a few kilometers today, with Ukraine now stating that Russian forces are within ten kilometers of the city and urging residents of Pokrovsk and nearby areas to evacuate while there is still time to do so. Russian troops, having secured the southern flank of Hrodivka, are now pushing into the town in earnest. They gained some ground today, but are still being kept out of the town center.
Footage released from Russian sources has confirmed that Russia managed to destroy a Ukrainian HIMARS inside of Sumy oblast, a very, very rare loss for the unit. Ukraine also likely lost one of their Challenger 2 tanks, of which they don't have many, inside of Kursk oblast. However Ukraine broke their previous record (set only days ago) of the largest mass surrender of Russian troops. A bunker by the border had been bypassed and cut off, and today the trapped Russian soldiers surrendered. Ukraine stated that in total, 102 soldiers surrendered from the bunker. Footage confirmed that many dozens of soldiers did surrender. On top of other footage from the past week and half, Russia is visually confirmed to have had several hundred troops surrender to Ukraine during their Kursk offensive. Ukrainian leadership has openly stated that they are replenishing their exchange fund, referring to prisoner swaps. Interestingly, both sides are waging the offensive with fairly low quality troops. The defenders are largely conscripts, many of legally are not supposed to fighting inside of Ukraine (though this is murky for a multitude of reasons, including that Russia views most of the front as running through its territory). Most of the remainder are loyal to Kadyrov, and his cadre of forces have pretty consistently underperformed. A sizable portion of the forces Ukraine has fielded has come from their program in which some prisoners were allowed to enlist in exchange for parole or time off of their sentences. However, the former convicts have been integrated into other units, whereas Wagner for instance had units almost entirely made of former prisoners. The difference in performance has been quite clear, with Wagner prisoner units taking mass casualties at Bakhmut, while Ukraine's units continue to perform adequately in Kursk oblast and have not taken immense casualties, though they have certainly taken some high profile losses of equipment.
Ukraine today set the stage for the northern bound of where they are planning their offensive, targeting a bridge in Glushkovo and the rail line leading into Lgov from the north. Ukrainian advances have also slowed, as they are focusing on trying to seize the city of Korenevo. But even with the Kursk offensive now having a potential geographic limit being drawn up by Ukraine, they are increasingly activating the Belgorod front, puncturing into the oblast at two additional separate points today, but each time once again by only a short distance. They are clearly prodding Russia's defenses here, trying to find a weak point. At the request of the government in Belgorod, Russia did declare a federal emergency, but ironically only going into effect for Belgorod oblast. Local authorities had been pushing for a federal state of emergency to impact the entire country.
On the heels of numerous Ukrainian drone strikes on four Russian airbases, Russia today lost a bomber over Siberia. This seems to have merely beena mechanical failure, with Ukraine not even making any vague statements suggesting that they may have played a role.
Lukashenko made major news today, declaring that he supported negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, stating that Ukrainian, Belarusian, and notably Russian citizens were broadly opposed to the war. Simultaneously, he also made the threat that he would not use the nuclear weapons supplied to Belarus by Russia unless the borders of the "Union State" (a political organization consisting only of Belarus and Russia) were violated, in which case he would use them immediately. Seeing as Ukrainian troops have been running around a Russian oblast for over a week, this threat is pretty toothless. It was likely bluster to cover his more serious, other talking point; a desire to see the war end. Lukashenko has despite tying Belarus closely to Russia hindered Putin more than once, such as by displaying battle plans on television. At the same time, he is certainly no friend to Ukraine, either. This could easily be an effort to undermine Putin's strength, by making it seem as if Putin needs to negotiate to end the invasion of Russia, or an effort to pressure Ukraine into signing a ceasefire which would be to Russia's benefit.
Almost simultaneously today, two major stories dropped involving JASSMs (Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles). They are long range missiles capable of being launched from F-16s, now in Ukrainian hands. Biden reportedly is "open" to the idea of transferring the missiles to Ukraine, pending technical and legal reviews. Presumably, they would have the same restrictions as other languages range missiles on them, meaning they couldn't be used against Russia itself or its airbases. But it would further add to Ukrainian long range strike capabilities, which are in short supply. Separately, a very strong indication that the transfer will go ahead in the future was reported on, with the United States inking a deal with Lockheed Martin to drastically scale up production of the missiles.