Map of Russian fortification lines on the Zaporozhye front.
The counteroffensive has begun, after a series of failed Ukrainian attacks in the preceding few days. The axis of attack does appear to be towards Tokmak, which is also the strongest part of the Russian defensive line.
From the late night of June 7th/very early morning of June 8th onwards, Ukraine has been sending waves of forces in to attack Russian defense lines. Ukrainian air defense is barely active if at all, with Russian aviation able to freely attack Ukrainian columns going through minefields. We've seen potential glances of Leopards and various western armored vehicles. Russian morale seems high so far.
Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.
Here is the archive of important pieces of analysis from throughout the war that we've collected.
This week's first update is here in the comments.
This week's second update is here in the comments.
This week's third update is here in the comments.
Links and Stuff
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Add to the above list if you can, thank you.
Resources For Understanding The War Beyond The Bulletins
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. I recommend their map more than the channel at this point, as an increasing subscriber count has greatly diminished their quality.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have decent analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: neo-conservative sources but their reporting of the war (so far) seems to line up with reality better than most liberal sources. Beware of chuddery.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent journalist reporting in the warzone.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Telegram Channels
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
Pro-Russian
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist (but still quite reactionary in terms of gender and sexuality and race, so beware). If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ Another big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia's army.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Last week's discussion post.
Ukraine's trying a night attack on the Zaporozhye front. Sending tanks and light vehicles in, probably hoping that their night vision technology is superior to the Russians'. Russian aviation is working. Ukrainian HIMARS is working (maybe not so well, idk). Seems like a big battle, bigger than a reconnaissance in force.
Some of the Russian commentators are asleep so we might only get drips of information.
edit: LOTS of Russian aircraft and helicopters flying around. Double digit numbers of each. It's a big one tonight. Maybe even THE big one.
edit: Ukraine tried to hit Tokmak with HIMARS. Russian anti-air is working and shot at least a large number if not all of them down. Ukraine has finally found where its stocks of artillery ammo are and are using them to cover their tank assaults. I expect them to break through at least somewhere on the first line - then we might see how the main defensive line through Tokmak holds. I don't envy Ukrainians having to navigate a minefield at night with helicopters and aircraft and artillery firing at you.
edit: I've heard absolutely nothing about territorial changes or captured settlements, good or bad, but it doesn't sound so good for the Ukrainians in terms of casualties. will it all be "worth" it (it's never really going to be worth it) or all for nothing?
edit: sounds like a massacre. five rounds of Russian sorties. tentatively, it looks like Russia's repelled the attacks so far and contained the pressure and Ukraine might be forced to retreat back very soon unless they have something up their sleeves. this is not the panicked, low-morale Russian force that the West hoped for at the very least.
edit: the Ukrainians just keep coming. yet more Russian sorties. Russians are also hitting Kharkiv and Sumy with missiles or drones.
edit: and they keep coming and coming. I don't throw the term "human wave attack" around lightly, but... anyway, on the meme war side of things, Russians on social media are making jokes about the probing. we've now got the prober to add to the coomer family.
edit: it's gonna be a long night I think. it's getting pretty absurd. I legitimately wonder if Russian forces on the front line will run out of ammunition before Ukraine stops sending waves in. Russian helicopters stopped working for a bit - they weren't shot down or anything, they had to land to refuel because the Ukrainians keep sending waves in.
edit: sunrise in Ukraine has arrived. a war correspondent has said that the tanks are turning around. I wanna see that Ukraine isn't doing a third attempt before I hang up my hat on this comment.
final edit: okay, if the doomer Rybar is saying that the attack was unsuccessful and Ukraine is retreating then that's enough confirmation for me. we'll have a clearer idea of what happened in the coming hours and days but holy moly. I have no idea what the Ukrainians were thinking.
finaler edit: apparently Ukrainian communications indicate that they'll try again in the morning. jesus christ.
AFU Commander Zapp Brannigan
I was hoping that yesterday the offensive was already over and Ukraine would just give up. :( Nope lets have 5000 more young men killed first, then maybe another couple thousand the next few days... each... and then we'll see.