The situation in Kharkiv oblast remains pretty unchanged, with little news coming from Hlyboke beyond confirmation that Ukraine has recaptured some outlying areas to its south over the past week or so. There's been little clarification from Vovchansk as well. The rest of the front in the region remains pretty stagnated, though Russia did claim to have captured a village. The only problem is, the village no longer exists, as it was razed decades ago. Russia made a similar claim about a no longer existent village in Luhansk oblast as well.
Russia is making slow, yet legitimate advances in Donetsk oblast. However, these are still slow, grinding pushes through mostly rural areas. The battle for the canal district of Chasiv Yar is still ongoing, and Russia doesn't appear to be set to score a major breakthrough here any time soon.
Russia's air power took another hit in North Ossetia today, but this time around, it wasn't a Ukrainian drone hitting an airbase. Instead, a Russian warplanes crashed, killing both pilots. The Kremlin has cited a "technical malfunction" as the cause. These are not extremely rare events, and the airframes from other countries also run into such issues. But their frequency is worth paying attention to, as Russia has put its air force to heavy work for over two years straight now, and maintenance prior to the war was rather patchy. If Russia starts encountering a lot more malfunctions with their planes in the coming months, it's a sign that their planes are reaching the end of their natural life span. And that means Russia will have to pour considerable resources into maintaining their current planes while manufacturing new ones. That said, I don't want to read too much into a single incident, and it likely was just a one off; Russia has had a few of these over the course of the war, but there hasn't been a surge of malfunctions.
Ukraine today officially presented the establishment of their Unmanned Systems Forces, the first full military branch in the world to be dedicated to drone warfare. The branch is still being put together, but a commander to oversee the Unmanned Systems Forces was named.
Zelenskyy visited Germany today. Alongside the signing of multiple economic deals, Germany also promised an additional Patriot battery to Ukraine, including a hundred interceptor missiles. Almost immediately, the United States also announced it would be providing Ukraine with an additional Patriot battery. Unfortunately, the posturing by countries with Patriots has meant that Ukraine has gone without these additional batteries longer than they should have. Both the United States and Germany are clearly fine with forking one over each, but they wanted the other (or a third country) to make the first move. Other countries involved in the dance include Romania, which (understandably) cited their own security needs as they are close to the Russian garrison in Transnistria and to the Black Sea, and Greece, which also cited their own security concerns (Turkey). Spain was also tapped in, and they earlier agreed to send missiles, but not the actual launchers or other components of a Parrot battery to Ukraine. In addition to the declarations by the United States and Germany, the Netherlands promised to provide components of a Patriot battery, specifically a radar and a small number of launchers. The Netherlands have largely emptied their Patriot stocks in support of Ukraine.
Additional significant support from the United States may be coming shortly. A meeting for June 13th between Biden and Zelenskyy has been announced, to take place in Italy on the side of the G7 summit, where further aid from the G7 as a group (all member states already back Ukraine in some way) may be announced as well. There has been a push to get the G7 to come to some sort of agreement regarding aid for Ukraine in recent days, ahead of the upcoming summit, but details as to what this might include have been sparse.