December 2 2024

On December 1, during a press conference with European Council President António Costa in Kyiv, President Zelenskyy stated that Ukraine will only join NATO as a whole country, with all its territories recognized as Ukrainian and all of the territories are part of NATO officially. He said that partial NATO membership would imply that the parts of Ukraine not under its control currently are not really Ukraine, and Ukraine will never accept that. He also said that NATO’s collective defense clause would not apply to Ukraine’s entire territory during the war, as many countries fear being drawn into the conflict. He said that if NATO countries were to be drawn into the war, support for Ukraine from NATO countries would decrease. He said that NATO membership provides the best security guarantee for Ukraine and membership in the EU provides financial security.

On October 16, U.S. Ambassador to NATO Julianne Smith said that NATO does not plan to invite Ukraine soon. Ukrainian Ambassador to NATO Natalia Galibarenko expressed hope for an invitation before President Biden’s term ends. NATO Parliamentary Assembly President Gerald Connolly stated that Ukraine could only enter NATO only occur after it regains control over all of its territories. Zelenskyy said that Ukraine has not received any formal commitments or guarantees from NATO.

Zelenskyy also said that NATO and the European Union should be involved in negotiations with Russia and that negotiations should take place after Ukraine gains a stronger position to negotiate from. He thinks that getting Russia to recognize Ukraine as an independent nation will be one of the toughest challenges. Zelenskyy said that freezing the conflict without strengthening Ukraine’s position would just cause Russia to attack again in 2-5 years and will likely succeed in destroying Ukraine.


EU Council President Antonio Costa and Zelenskyy discussed plans for Ukraine’s EU accession, with negotiations expected to begin in the first half of 2025. Meanwhile, the EU is working on the 15th sanctions package targeting Russia.


The European Union will provide Ukraine with $4.4 billion in December 2024 and plans to provide Ukraine with €1.5 billion monthly starting in January 2025. These funds will come from frozen Russian assets and can be used for military purposes.


Russian blogger dosye_sphiona reported that Ukraine landed a successful HIMARS strike on Russian forces in Kursk while they were holding a ceremony.

dosye_shpiona:

“Yesterday, November 30, 2024, a missile strike was launched against the command post of the 83rd separate airborne assault brigade of the Russian Airborne Forces (military unit 71289, Ussuriysk) in the Kursk region.

The strike was carried out using the HIMARS multiple-launch rocket system (cluster warhead).

As a result of the impact:
• 200 [dead]– 12 military personnel (4 officers);
• 300  [wounded] – 25 military personnel.

The peculiarity of this strike is the fact that it was carried out during a ceremonial formation on the occasion of the anniversary of the formation of the brigade ( from November 29, 1986, to the present ).”

In November, Ukraine reported that Russia suffered a loss of 45,720 Russian military personnel killed or injured. This is the highest number reported so far. On one day alone they reported 2,030 Russian casualties. The BBC has, as of November 29, confirmed 80,793 Russian soldiers being killed and has uncovered that it is pretty common for a Russian soldier to die within 2-4 weeks of reaching the front.

In November, Russia lost 307 tanks, worth roughly $450 million total, 889 armored combat vehicles worth about $500 million total, and 884 artillery pieces damaged/destroyed, worth about $700 million. Overall, Russia reportedly lost more than $3 billion worth of equipment in November.


On December 1, Russia launched a drone attack on a public bus in Kherson, resulting in three civilian deaths and seven injuries. Regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin reported that the injured were hospitalized and receiving medical care. A previous attack on November 30 targeted a bus stop in Antonivka, killing two and injuring one. A 52-year-old woman was hospitalized after this attack.


Ukraine’s 60th ‘Inhulets’ Separate Mechanized Brigade managed to capture a Russian T-80BVM tank, Russia’s most modernized version of the T-80. The tank was damaged but still repairable. It was only 300 meters from Russian positions. 98th Infantry Battalion engineers had to clear mines before the tank could be safely towed to Ukrainian lines. The tank has apparently been repaired and put back into service.


The Freedom of Russia Legion, which is fighting for Ukraine, has received TerMIT ground drones equipped with heavy weapons. These drones have Browning M2 heavy machine guns and Burya grenade launcher turrets installed. The turret can have different locations programmed into them, so they can rapidly switch back and forth with more speed and accuracy than human operators. The turrets and drones are remotely operated, allowing the Russian Legion to bring a lot of firepower to a particular battle without endangering its own soldiers.

TerMIT drones can carry up to 300 kilograms, has a range of 20km, can move at 10 km/h, and can carry out multiple tasks, including logistics, evacuating the wounded, mine laying, and operating as a weapons platform.


On December 1, 2024, Russian and Syrian aircraft intensified their bombing campaigns of the rebel-held city of Idlib, which is home to around four million people and has already been previously devastated by the war. The strikes hit residential areas in the city. At least seven people were reported dead, with dozens of people left injured. Syria and Russia claimed they were targeting rebels, and denied that there were civilian casualties.


On November 29, 2024, North Macedonian police arrested a Macedonian man who was attempting to join the Russian army to fight in Ukraine. The man communicated online with someone posing as a Russian army recruiter, offering €3,000 for joining the Russian military. In October, he traveled to Moscow intending to join the military. After he returned to Skopje he was questioned and he admitted that he planned to sign a contract to serve in the Russian army and undergo training for combat in Ukraine. He faces charges of participating in a foreign military and faces up to 3 years in prison.


Russia claimed that 29 drones attacked Russian regions on the night of November 30 to December 1 and that all drones were shot down.


On the night of November 30 -December 1, Russia launched 78 drones at Ukraine. Ukraine destroyed 32. 45 drones were “lost” from radar and one remained in the air at the time of the Air Force’s report.


Ukrainian high jumper Yaroslava Mahuchikh was named the world's best female athlete of 2024 at the World Athletics Awards ceremony. In 2024, Yaroslava Mahuchikh was also recognized as the European Female Athlete of the Year and included in the UP 100 list. In 2024 Mahuchikh won the gold medal in the high jump at the Olympics, earned the title of European Champion in the high jump, earned a silver medal at the Indoor World Championships, won the Diamond League title for the third consecutive time, broke the high jump world record with a 2.10m jump beating the previous record set in 1987.


President Zelenskyy agreed to record a podcast with American interviewer Lex Fridman after Fridman agreed to travel to Kyiv for the recording.


On November 29, 2024, 600 teddy bears placed were near the Washington Monument as a commemoration of the Ukrainian children killed in Russia’s war, with, each representing a child lost to Russian attacks. The teddy bears will be donated to Ukrainian orphanages, hospitals, and charities. As of September 2024, 575 Ukrainian children had been killed, and 1,609 injured by Russia since the full-scale invasion began.

USAID has provided cogeneration units that helped restore heat and water to thousands of people in Volyn, Khmelnytskyi, and Rivne oblasts after Russian attacks on November 28 left 1 million Ukrainians without heat and electricity, according to Bridget Brink, US Ambassador to Ukraine.

On November 30, it was reported that power engineers had restored electricity to 342,654 consumers in Ukraine, following outages caused by a massive Russian missile attack.


Putin approved the budget for 2025, increasing military spending to a record level of 32.5% of the total budget, which amounts to over $145 billion. This is roughly 6.3% of Russia’s GDP. The previous year, the military spending was 28.3% of the budget. Much of the additional funding will be used to expand Russia’s production capacity, including the repair and modernization of vehicles, the modernization and production of Russia’s missiles, and increased artillery shell production.


A fire broke out at the Polistirol-Stroy polystyrene factory in Yekaterinburg, Russia, on December 1. The fire spread over 1,500 square meters. The cause is unknown, and 62 firefighters and 22 pieces of firefighting equipment were deployed to the scene. The plant produces polystyrene used by the Russian military for shielding against thermal imaging, as well as drone production. This is just another in a long string of fires at Russian defense plants, including Uraltransmash and NPO Avtomatiki in 2024.


Five French MPs from different political parties have jointly called on the Defence Minister to send military instructors to Ukraine to train Ukrainian personnel and advocated for the creation of a European coalition led by France to provide this training. They said that North Korea is sending tens of thousands of men to help Russia, and Europe’s response should be to increase the support being provided to Ukraine. The MPs were Laurent Mazaury from the Yvelines, Libertés, Indépendants, Outre-Mer et Territoires party; Anna Pic from the Socialistes et apparentés party; Constance Le Grip from the Ensemble pour la République party; and Xavier Roseren from the Horizons & Indépendants party.


The 55th Artillery Brigade talked about the older 2007 6×6 version of the CAESAR 155mm self-propelled gun. Crew commander Andrii said that it is more maneuverable and easier to conceal than newer 8×8 models, which are larger and more complex and have more electronic components. Simple repairs are easier to do in Ukraine, while more complex issues require the systems to be sent to France for repairs. The 8×8 is much larger, requiring larger revetments to be dug, larger camouflage nets, and more extensive efforts to camouflage in general. The 6×6, being simpler, is easier to repair inside of Ukraine, getting the systems back into combat in less time and at less cost. A service center is under construction in Ukraine to facilitate repairs and potentially produce spare parts locally. Andrii said the barrel life is supposed to be about 4,000 shells, but guns still operate satisfactorily after 6,000 rounds pass through the barrel.


Quote of the Day:

“If you have an opinion, and that opinion is weak, hedgehogs do not consider it wisdom.
- Tiresias to Pentheus”

― Euripides, The Bacchae