Breaking News: Ukraine allegedly opens new offensive in Kursk

What we know as of 25-01-05

Numerous reports of a fresh Ukrainian Offensive in Russia’s Kursk Oblast

On the night of Jan, 3 I began hearing rumours from contacts of a new Ukrainian offensive commencing, there was at that time no information on the scale of direction of the attack. Today, information has become somewhat clearer.

This morning BBC, Reuters and The Kyiv Independent are all reporting confirming the news . Most of the information released to the press is from the Russian side, as usual Ukraine is being tight lipped in the early phases of an operation.

There are two interesting pieces of information that can be gleaned from Russian reports:

The first is that according to Russian sources Ukrainian forces broke through Russian defensive lines northeast of Sudzha.

The size of the operation is unclear, but the Russian milbloggers reported that the initial breaching force consisted of a mine clearing vehicle, 2 tanks 12 IFVs and a number of paratroopers.

Russian sources have claim that they now have the situation under control, however that may just be typical Russian boasting.

Maps released by the normally reliable NOELREPORTS show Ukrainian forces have advanced significantly towards the town of Bolshoye Soldatshoye.

A second possibly more interesting piece of the puzzle came from influential Russian milblogger FIGHTERBOMBER who claimed that Ukraine introduced a powerful new EW device during this offensive that caused all the Russian drones in the area to fall out of the sky at once.

I will continue to cover this latest development and will most likely have clearer information when the Brief returns tomorrow.