Days after U.S. officials announced a temporary pause on providing arms and some intelligence products to Ukraine, Russia on Friday made advances in its Kursk region and launched a massive missile and drone bombardment on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. The pause in assistance to Ukraine came in the wake of the blowout between U.S. President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during an Oval Office press conference called to discuss the peace process.
The cutoff of U.S. intelligence “significantly impacts Ukrainian force protection of High Value Equipment’s shoot, move and scoot timelines, indications and warning of high-threat aircraft,” a retired high-ranking Ukrainian officer told us. “It significantly hampers the ability to target Russian forces and conduct long-range strikes against critical, mobile high-value targets.”
The lack of satellite imagery over Kursk is playing a role in the Russian advance there, the retired officer added. The lack of air defense munitions is making it harder to battle Russian airstrikes.
“The move of Russia in Kursk was a surprise to us,” one battlefield commander told The War Zone. “We only had information about the attack right when it came.”
The commander did not know if there was a direct correlation, “but the fact is that the information is coming too late.”
The new Russian counteroffensive in Kursk is designed to dislodge Ukrainian forces who have been there since August. Ukraine may be forced to withdraw from the region, according to one media report.
“Ukrainian troops defending captured territory in Russia’s Kursk region are under fierce attack from a Russian counteroffensive that’s building up steam, and commanders will soon have to make a tough choice whether to continue the struggle or withdraw,” Politico reported. “If they get the timing wrong, Ukrainian forces risk being be cut off, warn military analysts.”
“The Ukrainian command must make a choice. Leave the Kursk region, completing the operation and preserving forces, or hold on, risking losing everything,” military analyst Yan Matveyev told the publication.
Russian forces have broken through Ukrainian defenses south of Sudzha and defenders are trying to stabilize the situation, an anonymous military source deployed in Kursk Oblast told the Ukrainska Pravda news outlet.
“We can confirm the quantity of attacks increased with glide bombs, Shaheds and [first-person view] drones,” said Capt. Alexander Kabanov, deputy commander of the electronic warfare battalion of the 15th Artillery Reconnaissance Brigade, told The New York Post. “A second military commander in Kursk added that while there ‘is no certain information,’ roughly ‘eight to 10 dune buggies of Russians broke through two to three [Ukrainian] positions’ in the area.”
As we previously reported, Ukraine launched the attack to draw Russian forces from battles in eastern Ukraine and to use Kursk as a bargaining chip in peace negotiations. Kabanov told the Post that those desired effects were not achieved in the long run.
“A greater effect was probably expected,” he said, adding that the ‘victory’ for Ukraine had been the ‘political and psychological effect’ of the Kursk operation on Putin,” Kabanov said. “Capturing Sudzha is an achievement, a certain demonstration of strength and capabilities. Did this actually achieve anything in the long term? As we see — no.”
“The situation in the Kursk borderland has become much more active: there has been no retreat of the Ukrainian Armed Forces from Malaya Loknya yet, but an assault is already underway, and the situation for the occupation forces there is very bad,” the Russian Defense Ministry (MoD) claimed on Telegram. “The problems with logistics have finally begun to develop into a collapse of the defense. Day and night, drones are taking out equipment and ammunition, attempts to send reinforcements and carry out rotation are being stopped. We are expecting good news.”
As its troops appeared to be advancing in Kursk, Russia launched a massive missile and drone attack, largely aimed at Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. It marked the first such Russian attack since the U.S. stopped providing intelligence products to Ukraine.
“On the night of March 7, 2025, Russian occupiers carried out a combined strike with missiles of different types of air, land and sea bases on critical infrastructure objects,” the Ukrainian Air Force stated. “The main focus of the impact is on the objects of the gas mining industry of Ukraine.”
The Air Force claimed that its radio-technical troops “detected and escorted 261 enemy air assault vehicles – 67 rockets of various types and 194 attack drones and imitation drones of various types.
“The air attack of the enemy was repelled by anti-aircraft missile units, REB equipment and mobile fire groups of the Air Force and Defense Forces of Ukraine,” the Ukrainian Air Force stated.
At least two people were injured as a result of the attacks after a Russian missile damaged two residential buildings in Poltava Oblast, according to the Kyiv Independent.
“Russia took advantage of this intel gap and launched a major strike package against Ukraine on the evening of March 6-7 using multiple ships, a sub and 11 Tu-95s,” the retired high-ranking Ukrainian officer told us.
The U.S. pause on sharing intelligence with Kyiv “affects warnings against Russian drones and missiles striking Ukrainian military and civilian targets,” the Kyiv Independent noted.
Retired Australian Army Maj. Gen. Mick Ryan, a frequent commentator on the war, suggested that Russia is testing Ukrainian vulnerabilities in the way of the intelligence sharing cutoff.
As the Institute for the Study of War noted, Ukraine will face a tough choice in which cities to defend should it run out of air defense munitions.
The overnight barrage was notable for another reason.
“F-16 and Mirage-2000 planes were also involved. It’s worth noting that French fighters, which arrived in Ukraine just a month ago, took part in the repelling of enemy air strikes for the first time,” the Ukrainian Air Force stated.
Meanwhile, Maxar Technologies said it could no longer provide Ukraine with satellite imagery under the Trump administration’s new intel-sharing rules. The Ukrainian military has relied on this imagery to find Russian troop and equipment concentrations and for battle damage assessments.
One of Maxar’s many contracts is with “GEGD (the Global Enhanced GEOINT Delivery program), a U.S. government program that provides access to commercial satellite imagery that has been tasked and collected by the U.S. government,” company spokesperson Gia DeHart told us in a statement. “The U.S. government has decided to temporarily suspend Ukrainian accounts in GEGD. We take our contractual commitments very seriously, and there is no change to other Maxar customer programs.”
The GEGD program is run by the U.S. National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA).
“NGA has temporarily suspended access to the Global Enhanced GEOINT Delivery system, or GEGD, which is the primary portal for access to U.S. government-purchased commercial imagery,” an NGA spokesperson said in a statement. However, “this only applies to the imagery in the GEGD platform, purchased by the U.S. government,” the spokesperson told us.
“Free access to images has been closed,” the Ukrainian CyberBoroshno Telegram channel stated. “According to our information, at least private companies can buy already ordered images through a provider. Free access was used at all levels and it helped both to track the enemy’s accumulation at the tactical level and activity at operational and strategic level facilities. We hope that the Ministry of Defense is working with European partners on this issue.”
Ukraine, however, was not completely blinded.
“A French satellite operator is working with European authorities to increase their satellite service in Ukraine,” the Euronews Next news outlet said the company told it.
“We are actively collaborating with European institutions and business partners to enable the swift deployment of additional user terminals for critical missions,” a spokesperson for Eutelsat told Euronews Next.
The company is also in talks to replace Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet system in Ukraine, Bloomberg News reported. Starlink is widely used by Ukrainian front line units and there is concern that Musk could order them turned off over Ukraine.
Meanwhile, France is stepping in to help, French Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu said.
“We have intelligence resources that we are providing to the Ukrainians,” Lecornu said on air on France Inter.
In addition, as we have reported in the past, Ukraine has a crowd-funded contract with the Finnish ICEYE satellite company. Last June, Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Directorate (GUR) said that more than 1,500 Russian targets worth billions of dollars were destroyed thanks to imagery from the ICEYE satellite system.
Because the contact was between individuals and ICEYE, it is not affected by the new NGA satellite imagery rules. We reached out to the company to find out more details and will update this story with any pertinent information provided.
In addition to the Ukrainian military, news organizations have relied on Maxar imagery to gain a better understanding of battlefield conditions and the aftermath of attacks. That imagery will still be available, the company told TWZ.
“No changes to the News Bureau,” DeHart explained.
The pause in providing Ukraine with intelligence is also hindering Ukraine’s ability to use its donated M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), according to The Washington Post. The systems rely on U.S. intelligence data for accurate strikes. It does not, however, affect the ability to launch these weapons.
The intelligence pause follows the Trump-ordered temporary suspension of U.S. arms deliveries to Ukraine that became public on Monday.
“The order affects more than $1 billion in arms and ammunition in the pipeline and on order,” The New York Times reported. “It resulted from a series of meetings at the White House on Monday between Mr. Trump and his senior national security aides,” the publication stated, citing anonymous officials. “The officials said the directive would be in effect until Mr. Trump determined that Ukraine had demonstrated a good-faith commitment to peace negotiations with Russia.”
Asked whether Russian President Vladimir Putin is taking advantage of the intelligence and weapons supply pauses, Trump said the Russian leader was doing what “anybody else would do.
“I think he’s, I think he wants to get it stopped and settled, and I think he’s hitting them harder than he’s been hitting them,” Trump answered. “And I think probably anybody in that position would be doing that right now.”
The retired high-ranking Ukrainian officer told us he feels “betrayed” by the U.S. intelligence and arms cutoff, especially of weapons like air defense munitions and anti-tank systems.
“I only hope that European partners will start to care better,” he said. “Looking at the U.S. government, I feel betrayed…It is not peace through strength strategy, it is peace through betrayal of the Ukrainian people.”
The Latest
Elsewhere on the battlefield, Russia continues to grind out incremental advances in Ukraine’s eastern region of Donetsk. However, Kyiv’s forces also gained a little ground there as well.
Here are some key takeaways from the latest Institute for the Study of War (ISW) assessment.
- Sumy: Russian forces continued offensive operations along the international border in Sumy Oblast on March 6 but did not make any confirmed advances.
- Kharkiv: Russian forces continued offensive operations in the Kharkiv direction on March 6 but did not make any confirmed advances.
- Luhansk: Russian forces recently advanced in the Borova and Kupyansk directions but did not make any confirmed advances toward Lyman.
- Donetsk: Russian forces recently advanced in the Kurakhove, Pokrovsk and Siversk directions but did not make any gains near Chasiv Yar, Velyka Novosilka or Toretsk. Ukraine, meanwhile, also made advances toward Pokrovsk.
- Zaporizhzhia: Russian forces continued offensive operations in western Zaporizhzhia Oblast on March 6 but did not make confirmed advances.
- Kherson: Neither Ukrainian nor Russian sources reported Russian ground attacks in the Kherson direction on March 6.
Before the U.S. paused providing Ukraine with intelligence and weapons, Russia was finding it “significantly” harder to conduct combat operations against Ukraine because of a rise in Ukrainian long-range drone strikes on Russian weapons supplies, ammunition depots and fuel refineries, a senior commander told Sky News.
Brig. Gen. Yuriy Shchygol “signaled these attacks would grow, revealing that his country plans to more than quadruple the production rate of deep strike drones – with a range of hundreds of miles – to more than 2,000 aircraft a month,” the publication reported.
Senior Trump administration figures are planning to meet Zelensky in Saudi Arabia next week as Ukraine scrambles to repair its tattered relationship with Washington, its largest benefactor, officials from both sides have said.
Next week’s meeting is set to be between Zelensky, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and national security adviser Mike Waltz, Witkoff told reporters Thursday. He added that the venue will either be the capital, Riyadh, or the Red Sea city of Jeddah.
In addition to cutting off intelligence to Ukraine, Trump reiterated statements he made in January suggesting he could impose new sanctions on Russian banking to get them to the bargaining table.
At the same time, the administration appears to be looking for ways to reduce sanctions on Russia’s energy industry, a prime source of revenue.
Neither side has a choice but to sign a peace deal, Trump argued. He claimed that “only I know” why Russia needs to reach an agreement.
Meanwhile, the Russian media seems ecstatic about Trump’s pivot to Moscow, with one outlet stating that it sees the increased pressure on Ukraine “as a golden opportunity to make gains on the battlefield.”
Amid concerns about a U.S. abandonment of Europe, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk suggested his nation pursue nuclear weapons to defend against Russian aggression.
“Poland must pursue the most advanced capabilities, including nuclear and modern unconventional weapons,” Tusk told the Polish parliament. “This is a serious race – a race for security, not for war.” The statement comes amongst a backdrop of growing concerns of nuclear proliferation around the globe that could result from a major pullback by the U.S. from key allies and hotspots.
The U.K will provide Ukraine with 5,000 Lightweight Multi-role Missiles to use as air defense munitions, the U.K. Defense Ministry announced last week.
Ukraine’s armed forces will receive a new wave of advanced attack drones under a £30 million ($38.76 millon) deal agreed between the UK government and defense technology firm Anduril UK, according to a press release.
“The contract, backed by the International Fund for Ukraine (IFU), will see Anduril UK supply cutting-edge Altius 600m and Altius 700m drones,” the U.K. Defence Journal noted.
“Altius attack drones have already taken out hundreds of millions of dollars worth of Russian targets, including critical hardware protected by EW systems that would have been hard to defeat any other way,” Anduril founder Palmer Luckey said on X. “Credible threat of violence is the backstop for good diplomacy.”
A crowd-funded Czech effort by the Dárek pro Putina initiative resulted in the purchase for GUR of a UH-60 helicopter, the organization announced on X.
A pan-European air force of 120 fighter jets “could be deployed to secure the skies from Russian attacks on Kyiv and western Ukraine without necessarily provoking a wider conflict with Moscow,” The Guardian reported, citing “a plan drawn up by military experts.”
“Sky Shield, its proponents argue, would be a European-led air protection zone operated separately from NATO to halt Russian cruise missile and drone attacks on cities and infrastructure, potentially operating as part of the ‘truce in the sky’ proposed by Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, this week,” the publication noted.
“It would cover Ukraine’s three operating nuclear power plants and the cities of Odesa and Lviv, but not the frontline or the east of the country – and, according to a newly published paper, it could ‘achieve greater military, political, and socioeconomic impact than 10,000 European ground troops.’”
The cost and ability to field such a large and sustained aerial air defense force is somewhat questionable, especially without the United States. In the past, similar no-fly-zones and air defense concepts have been outright avoided for Ukraine due to fears of escalation by putting NATO assets directly into the conflict.
There are several factors Europe needs to consider in raising any peacekeeping force, suggests Michael Kofman and Jack Watling in a new War on The Rocks analysis.
“The size of Ukraine, and the extensive front line, spanning over 750 miles (1200 kilometers) can lead one to presume that the requirements for a force are beyond the means of NATO’s European militaries,” they argue. “Yet what Ukraine needs is not a traditional peacekeeping or separation force which has to be stretched along the line of contact. As such, it’s not about the size of the front. Although European leaders may call it a ‘peacekeeping’ force, this is not going to be a traditional U.N. peacekeeping mission. The force would serve two functions. First, assure Ukraine. With Western backing, Ukraine should be able to maintain a force sufficient to man, or patrol, key sectors of the front line. Second, enhance deterrence against future aggression from Russia through both the capability deployed and the inherent risk of directly engaging Western forces.”
Feeling emboldened by Trump’s move toward Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was unequivocal in his opposition to the idea of European peacekeeping troops in Ukraine.
“No way,” he said in response to a question from BBC Moscow reporter Steve Rosenberg. “We see no room for compromise here…”
Zelensky still has a great deal of support in Ukraine, according to the latest poll from the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).
“As of the first half of February 2025, before the aggravation of relations between Ukraine and the United States, 57% of Ukrainians trusted President Volodymyr Zelenskyi, while 37% did not. The balance of trust-distrust was +20%,” KIIS stated. “Further, in the period from February 14 to March 4, 2025, the level of trust increased to 67%, while the share of those who do not trust decreased to 29%. Accordingly, the balance of trust-distrust improved to +38%.”
Trump peace envoy, Keith Kellogg, tried to make light of his boss’s promise to quickly end the war.
“The president said he would end the war in 24 hours,” Kellogg said. “He didn’t say what day, what year.”
Ukraine “is advancing AI-driven unmanned systems to reduce direct warfighter involvement while enhancing combat effectiveness,” according to a new report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
“Although fully autonomous warfare remains an aspiration, significant progress has already been made in partial autonomy—particularly for aerial systems—while human oversight remains critical in engagement decisions,” the report found.
CSIS also highlighted how the Ukrainian military’s objective “is to remove warfighters from direct combat and replace them with autonomous unmanned systems” and that “delegating target recognition to AI-enabled automatic target recognition (ATR) systems onboard unmanned platforms reduces human limitations and allows locking on to targets up to 2 km away.”
You can read more about the role of AI in drones in our in-depth report here.
The Ukrainian Navy claims its uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) recently launched first-person view (FPV) drones to attack and destroy two Russian SAM systems in an undisclosed area. It’s the latest such effort claimed by Ukraine.
The drone-boat-launched FPVs “hit the Strela-10 and Osa-AKM air defense systems!” the Ukrainian Navy exclaimed. “This excellent result was made possible thanks to the combat work of the Navy in cooperation with the Security Service of Ukraine, innovative solutions by Ukrainian engineers, as well as your donations.” You can see the drones launching the attacks in the following video.
Ukraine’s defense giant, Ukroboronprom, has increased production of Bren 2 assault rifles to 400 units per day, Ukraine’s Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security reported.
“With Czech partner Colt CZ plans underway to transition the Armed Forces of Ukraine from Soviet-era rifles to Bren 2’s, improving standardization and supply,” the center stated. “Ukraine is slowly becoming the core of Europe’s defense sector.”
Lithuania formally withdrew from the Convention on Cluster Munitions, an international treaty that bans the production and distribution of this controversial weaponry. That move took place on March 6, according to the Kyiv Independent.
Ukraine’s special operations forces released body cam video showing what it claims to be an attack on Russian and North Korean troops in Russia’s Kursk region. The operators from the SOF 6th Ranger Regiment claimed they killed eight enemy soldiers, including some from North Korea.
Russian forces continue trying to capture the eastern Ukrainian city of Chasiv Yar, located in Donetsk Oblast. The following video, released by the 24th King Danylo Motorized Rifle Brigade, shows a Russian assault repelled.
Several Ukrainian military units have taken part in a “flash mob” social media campaign to thank Americans for their support during the war.
“Dear Americans, thank you for all the support you have brought to Ukraine,” a HAWK air defense system operator stated in the following video. “This HAWK SAM [surface-to-air missile] has already shot down a bunch of cruise missiles.”
A Ukrainian Su-25 Frogfoot pilot made a similar appeal in a video showing his aircraft releasing French-donated AASM-250 Hammer rocket-assisted bombs.
And finally, a Russian soldier tried to deflect a Ukrainian FPV drone by kicking at it. As you can see in the following video, the encounter did not go well for him.
That’s it for now.
Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com