Ukraine has declared the successful end of an operation in which it recaptured 745 square kilometres (287 square miles) of its territory this year in its southern region of Dnipropetrovsk.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced on Wednesday that the campaign was carried out “exactly as it was determined” and said almost 10,000 Russian soldiers were killed in the process.

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The counteroffensive deprived Russia of almost all the territory it had gained in Dnipropetrovsk since entering that region in June 2025, and pushed it back over the regional borders of Donetsk and Zaporizhia.

But this good news for Ukrainians was overshadowed by intensified Russian missile strikes against their cities, which remain increasingly defenceless after the exhaustion of Patriot interceptors.

Combined strikes of drones and ballistic or hypersonic missiles hit Kyiv on August 8 and 11, plunged Odesa in darkness on August 9, and struck the city of Zaporizhzhia on August 11, killing at least nine people across all strikes.

Ukraine pushing back on the ground

Zelenskyy said the Dnipropetrovsk operation alone had liberated 26 settlements.

The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank that assesses territorial control using geolocated open-source information, conservatively assessed that Ukraine had clawed back at least 627sq km (242 square miles) in the area.

“This operation once again proved that the Ukrainian army is capable not only of steadfastly holding its defences, but also of launching offensives, seizing the initiative, and liberating Ukrainian land,” said former commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskii, who planned it.

The ISW assessed that across the front, Russia has suffered a net loss of 233sq km (90 square miles) this year.

This is despite concerted Russian offensives in the eastern Donetsk region, whose capture Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly prioritised.

Russian assaults in June and July have been launched out of Pokrovsk towards Dobropillia, and out of Chasiv Yar towards Kostiantynivka. In both areas, Russia has captured territory and infiltrated large areas beyond it, but this has come at a cost.

Russia suffered a reported 39,000 casualties in June and nearly 43,000 in July – its highest losses since January 2025.

One of the keys to Ukraine’s success on the battlefield has been its scaling up of short-range, first-person view (FPV) drone production, where it now fields 16 drones to every Russian 10. Such drones caused more than 70 percent of Russian casualties in June and July.

Ukraine’s success in disarming Russia of its own FPV drones has also been climbing.

Ukraine downed more than 40,000 Russian drones in July, almost one and a half times as many as it downed in May, Ukraine’s defence ministry said.

Russia goes ballistic

Russia has held command of the air throughout its war in Ukraine, unleashing glide bombs, long-range drones and missiles. It is now pressing that advantage by increasing ballistic and hypersonic missiles, deputy military intelligence chief Vadym Skibitskyi told the news service RBC Ukraine.

Ukraine has only been able to intercept these types of missiles with Patriot systems, but has now run out of interceptors because, said Zelenskyy, it has received almost three times fewer this year from its allies than it did in 2025.

Skibitskyi said Russia has stopped producing missiles Ukraine became adept at shooting down, and diverted components to build greater numbers of Iskander-M ballistic missiles and S-400 hypersonic missiles.

The latter were designed as a surface-to-air missile against enemy aircraft, but have been reprogrammed to follow steep ballistic trajectories and have proven as effective as the Iskanders.

This retooling is yielding results, said Skibitskyi, as Russian industry is beating production targets in most missile categories.

“In April there were 61 ballistic missiles, in May – 107, in June – 134,” he said. “If we talk about ballistic and hypersonic missiles … the enemy launched 198 of them in July. This is the highest figure this year.”

Russia currently produces more than 100 ballistic and hypersonic missiles a month, and may have dipped into stockpiles to launch 56 of these missiles at Ukraine in just the first week of August, but it plans to increase stockpiles for a massive winter campaign against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, Skibitskyi said.

Last winter, Russia caused up to $70bn of damage to Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, and nearly succeeded in plunging Kyiv into darkness.

Russia may also be planning a massive strike on Kyiv before Ukraine’s Independence Day on August 24, said Ukraine’s Center for Strategic Communications.

Several Ukrainian sources said North Korea was sending a force with up to 120 ballistic missiles to Russia’s western region of Voronezh, adjacent to Ukraine, where barracks were being built for it.

In an interview with Serhiy Sternenko, former defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov said Ukraine’s best response to Russian ballistics was to rush its own successfully tested ballistic missile into production and engage in “counter-ballistic warfare”.

“The Russians must understand that a few minutes after the launch, the entire team that launches the missile must die from our ballistic missile,” Fedorov said.

Skibitskyi also said Russia was prioritising production of its jet-powered Geran 4 and Geran 5 drones, which are harder to intercept than slower-flying, piston-engine drones.

He said Russia was launching its own version of the Starlink satellite network, called Rassvet, ahead of schedule, with 16 satellites now up and a planned increase to 292 in 2027.

Russia suffered a setback when last February, Starlink disabled the terminals it was using to communicate on the battlefield and coordinate accurate counter-battery fire.

Ukraine’s long reach

Ukraine has destroyed almost a third of Russia’s refining capacity this year with its long-range drones. During the past week it struck four refineries, including Gazprom’s Neftekhim Salavat refinery in the Republic of Bashkortostan, 1,300km (810 miles) from Ukraine.

Ukraine has also pursued medium-range strikes on Russian military logistics and Russian oil tankers, starving the front line of weapons and fuel. During the past week, it brought to 218 the number of ships it has sunk or disabled, and destroyed six air defence systems.

Its most spectacular hit was on the Russian main Black Sea port of Novorossiysk on August 12, where it struck two frigates, a missile ship, a landing ship and a patrol ship. It also hit Russia’s Sheshkharis oil offloading terminal, part of a campaign to starve Russia of fossil fuel export revenue.

Zelenskyy called the operation “unique” because it was the first time Ukraine had coordinated 14 types of domestically built aerial and surface drones simultaneously.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The two most senior members of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, flew out of last month’s NATO summit in Turkey on what was effectively a decoy plane following an Iranian threat, while Trump was secretly moved to a smaller military jet, a senior U.S. official said Wednesday.

The official, who was briefed on the situation and spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details of presidential travel, said Rubio was aware of the switch and details of the threat behind it but could or would not say why he had stayed on the plane. The official said Bessent was likely aware but did not know for sure.

The official, however, noted that security precautions for the president — especially one who has been the target of several assassination attempts — are more robust than those for even top members of the Cabinet.

Under the U.S. Constitution, the secretaries of State and Treasury follow the vice president and the highest ranking member of each chamber of Congress in the presidential line of succession.

Trump had flown to the annual gathering of NATO country leaders in Ankara, Turkey, in a new Qatari-gifted and retrofitted red, white and navy blue jet. But ahead of departing Turkey, he said he would fly partway home on an older-model baby blue Air Force One plane instead.

The president at the time said the new luxury jet was being flown out ahead of his departure from Ankara to give some U.S. troops based in eastern England a chance to check out the new Air Force One.

The Washington Post reported this week that Trump wasn’t on the old Air Force One on the return flight from Turkey and that he instead was smuggled onto another jet via a catering cart to avoid a possible Iranian assassination plot. The ruse was carried out as journalists and some White House staff members were led to believe they were on the same plane as the president as he began his journey back to Washington.

The New York Times and CBS News had reported last month that intelligence officials had raised concerns about a potential attack on the president or his jet, triggering additional precautions and the decision not to use the newly inaugurated aircraft gifted to Trump by Qatar for the first leg of Trump’s trip home from Ankara.

Trump acknowledged the transfer late Tuesday.

“It’s only up to the Secret Service. I just follow what they’d like to do, so I go by Secret Service and the military,” the president told reporters at Joint Base Andrews. “They wanted me to go on a different flight, a different plane, equal safety, but they wanted me to do it, so I do it, I do what they say.”

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A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the last 24 hours. Here’s today’s news:

IRAN WAR 

A senior Iranian source told Reuters that “one of the issues being discussed via mediators is the U.S. returning to the interim agreement [with Iran] and defining a time frame for implementing the commitments. The source added that “there has been absolutely no progress on this issue.” The source further dismissed a Turkish news report quoting Pakistani government sources saying they had agreed to extend the interim deal’s 60-day period. Parisa Hafezi and Elwely Elwelly report.

IRAN WAR – LEBANON 

The Washington Post reports that the announcement in June of a preliminary peace deal between Israel and Lebanon has had little impact on daily life in southern Lebanon. According to residents, Israeli forces continue to restrict their movement, leaving many feeling trapped. “We are trapped in a prison,” Ayoub Khreish, mayor of Ain Ebel, said. “Even ambulances need permission to enter and leave.” Mohamad El Chamma reports. 

Israel and Lebanon have agreed on Britain, Italy, Switzerland, and Indonesia as potential contributors to a proposed mechanism that could see foreign troops deployed to Lebanon to verify Hezbollah’s disarmament, sources said. Alexander Cornwell and Maya Gebeily report for Reuters.  

IRAN WAR – OTHER DEVELOPMENTS 

U.S. intelligence officials were skeptical of an Iranian assassination threat against President Trump that was relayed by Israel last month, and prompted Trump’s secret Air Force One swap, current and former U.S. officials told the Washington Post. CIA analysts did not view the Israeli intelligence as compelling and conveyed this to Trump administration officials, one source said. Another called the threats “Israeli-derived, not U.S.-generated, and viewed as low confidence.” The Secret Service, however, deemed a threat that Trump could be targeted by a shoulder-fired missile to be credible and imminent. A source declined to tell Reuters where the intelligence came from but said officials had little time to prepare and devised the plane swap plan at the last minute. Warren P. Strobel, John Hudson, and Dan Lamothe report; Steve Holland reports. 

RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR 

A Ukrainian attack yesterday hit warships at a naval base and forced two major grain terminals in Russia’s Black Sea port city of Novorossiysk to halt operations, according to Russian and Ukrainian officials. The Ukrainian attacks killed at least two people, ​including an 8-year-old child, regional Governor Veniamin Kondratyev said. As Russia is the world’s largest wheat exporter, the strikes on the grain terminals raised fears ​of a disruption to global supplies. Chicago wheat futures rose around 3% yesterday after the attack on Novorossiysk. Reuters reports.  

ISRAEL-HAMAS WAR 

The Trump administration was initially “disappointed” that Israel responded to the 15-point peace plan by escalating attacks in Gaza earlier this month, but is pleased that it has since eased its assault, a U.S. official said. The official added that the administration is willing to give Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu some leeway on domestic messaging around the peace plan ahead of elections in Israel. But in turn, “they need to give us a little bit of space in terms of no targeted killings in order to allow us to try to get to the next phase,” the official said. Myah Ward and Megan Messerly report for POLITICO.  

An Israeli drone strike yesterday hit a Hamas commander in northern Gaza, the Israeli military said, though it remains unclear if he was killed. It was the first targeted strike Israel has announced since Aug. 3. The Gaza Health Ministry has reported 45 people killed since Aug. 1. AP News reports. 

WEST BANK VIOLENCE 

Two Palestinian families have been trapped since Sunday inside their homes in the village of Qusra in the occupied West Bank by a group of Israeli settlers. Residents report that about 10 to 15 settlers have been attacking them consistently for days, throwing stones and an axe. Although Israeli soldiers arrived early Wednesday and used tear gas to disperse the attackers, they left within hours, and the settlers resumed their attacks, residents and army officials said. The Israeli army said last night that it was assigning an extra battalion to the West Bank to “strengthen order and operational control in the area.” David M. Halbfinger, Fatima AbdulKarim, and Natan Odenheimer report for the New York Times.  

OTHER GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS 

The Taliban’s General Director of Intelligence detained two Afghan members of the U.N. political mission in Herat, Afghanistan on Sunday, a U.N. spokesman said yesterday. The spokesman added that the U.N. mission has not been informed of the charges against the two men or been able to visit them. Edith M. Lederer reports for AP News.  

TECH DEVELOPMENTS 

Taiwan detected AI-assisted cyberattacks on government agencies last month, but the affected bodies successfully handled the incident, the Taiwanese Ministry of Digital Affairs said today. The investigation ​results showed the attacks displayed clear characteristics of an “overseas source,” with hackers employing a hybrid approach that combined manual operations with AI agent-assisted attacks, such as Open Claw, it said.  Ben Blanchard and Raphael Satter report for Reuters.  

Before stepping down as Google DeepMind CEO, Demis Hassabis held discussions with government officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and leaders of other AI labs about forming a new independent AI safety entity, sources said. Hassabis has likened the proposed entity to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the nuclear watchdog. Robbie Whelan, Amrith Ramkumar, and Keach Hagey report for the Wall Street Journal.  

Anthropic’s new models will add machine-readable “watermarks” to Claude-generated text and files to comply with new EU transparency regulations. Simon Hernandez-Arthur reports for Axios.  

U.S. FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Ukrainian drone units easily spotted and defeated U.S. troops and armored vehicles during a military exercise in Germany earlier this year, sources told the Wall Street Journal. The exercise, held in April and May, tested visiting troops’ ability to operate and defend against the proliferation of smaller, front-line drones that have dominated the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Alistair MacDonald, Lara Seligman, and Daniel Michaels report.

“We do bad things to bad people,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told civilian defense leaders and generals at a meeting of a U.S.-led counter-cartel coalition in Panama yesterday, adding that the collective goal is “to degrade, dismantle, and destroy narco-terrorist networks.” Hegseth also raised the possibility of joint strikes on Colombian armed groups, as he welcomed Colombia into the coalition. Eric Schmitt and Annie Correal report for the New York Times; Phil Stewart reports for Reuters.  

U.S. foreign-aid cuts have disrupted maternal and child-health programs in Nepal, already leading to increased pregnancy complications and deaths, according to government officials, aid workers, and families interviewed by AP News. Kristen Gelineau reports.

U.S. IMMIGRATION DEVELOPMENTS  

The State Department announced this week that it has created a task force to crack down on “birth tourism,” reviewing visa holders worldwide and revoking visas of people involved. The department said more than 600 visas have already been revoked. Laura Kelly reports for The Hill. 

ICE agent Adam Saracco pleaded guilty yesterday to misdemeanor battery after throwing immigration activist Robert Held to the ground and taking his phone during an altercation near Chicago in December. Madaleine Rubin reports for the New York Times.  

A masked ICE agent in Virginia pointed a gun at Carolina Molina on Monday after accusing her of trying to run over agents with her car, but videos from the encounter appear to show her vehicle stationary and provide no evidence of an attempted attack. Madaleine Rubin reports for the New York Times.

U.S. DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS 

Former Southern Property Law Center official Heidi Beirich was charged yesterday with fraud and conspiracy as part of a revised indictment accusing the group of cheating its donors by using their money to pay informants inside right-wing extremist organizations. “I believe she was part of the effort to open bank accounts in completely fictitious companies’ names and make payments to individuals for reasons that were not accurate as described,” Attorney General Todd Blanche said. Alan Feuer reports for the New York Times.    

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ACTIONS 

Karoline Leavitt will be stepping down from her role as White House press secretary at the end of this month, Trump announced yesterday on social media, adding that Leavitt is leaving to spend more time with her family. Herb Scribner and Avery Lotz report for Axios. 

The Trump administration plans to spend at least $900 million for construction projects on the White House grounds, according to records reviewed by the Washington Post, with more funding coming from taxpayers and money redirected from federal agencies, rather than through direct congressional appropriations. The Post reports that the administration has routed much of the funding through the relatively obscure White House maintenance account. Jonathan O’Connell and Sarah Blaskey report. 

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION LITIGATION

The Trump administration again asked the Supreme Court yesterday to intervene to fully implement Trump’s executive order restricting the use of mail-in ballots ahead of the November midterm elections. Andrew Chung reports for Reuters.  

The Intercept, a news organization, and the Freedom of the Press Foundation filed a lawsuit yesterday against Trump over his social media platform’s program that offers paid early access to his posts, after the scheme went live earlier this month. The plaintiffs argue that the $100,000-a-month program violates their First Amendment rights to access presidential statements “on equal terms with other members of the press and public.” Emilio Perez Ibarguen reports for POLITICO.

Did you miss this? Stay up-to-date with our Litigation Tracker: Legal Challenges to Trump Administration Actions.

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ICYMI: Yesterday on Just Security

FEATURED IMAGE: WASHINGTON - JANUARY 23: Clouds move as the sun sets against the west front of the United States Capitol building January 23, 2007 in Washington, DC. U.S. President George W. Bush is scheduled to deliver his State of the Union speech before a joint meeting of Congress at 9:00 PM Eastern. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

President Trump speaks to reporters on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews as White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt stands nearby.

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is entering the scale phase of its artificial intelligence (AI) implementation and has hundreds of AI projects underway, Israel Soong, deputy director of the CIA’s Office of AI, said Tuesday. 

After years of work, Soong said during a Federal News Network webinar that the agency has successfully rolled out an AI literacy program to thousands of officers, built a state-of-the-art model repository, deployed a chatbot, and partnered with four major cloud providers to bring frontier model capabilities to the agency. 

In some cases, Soong said that the agency is able to make new models available to users within seven to 10 days after they are released. 

“Over the past few years, we’ve made significant investments in foundational infrastructure to make AI broadly available across the CIA,” Soong said. “And right now, we’re kind of at an inflection point. Like, we’ve moved decisively beyond asking, ‘Should we adopt AI?’ to asking, ‘How do we operationalize it responsibly at scale?’” 

“In other words, we successfully completed an additional adoption phase, and now we’re expanding the capabilities and trying to transform mission execution,” he added. 

The next step for the agency is to continue to accelerate the adoption of AI while eliminating redundancies and prioritizing resource allocations, Soong said. 

“Now what we need is strategic stewardship,” he explained. “Now we’re trying to work AI into our mission workflows, not just as experimental tools, but as reliable capabilities changing how our workforce operates daily.” 

One way the CIA is doing that is by embedding large language models, retrieval-augmented generation techniques, and chatbot-style interfaces directly into analysts’ daily workflows, Soong said. The goal, he added, is to free officers from time-consuming data review and allow them to focus on more complex mission tasks. 

“Already, we’re seeing significant benefits to CIA’s intelligence mission,” Soong said. “It’s not the AI or the cloud in isolation, but all the elements of the AI tech stack working together, … that integrated approach of the two stacks is key.” 

In the future, Soong says that AI agents will also play a role in the CIA’s daily operations, picturing a world where  there are “teams of CIA officers managing teams of AI agents.” 

“There’s a potential for AI to assist analysis, but also identify blind spots for the analyst and generate novel hypotheses for them to consider when they write about their analysis. Also, we could have AI autonomously identify intelligence gaps and generate novel collection strategies,” Soong explained, adding that the CIA is aiming to have officers spend 80% of their time thinking critically about intelligence instead of collecting it. 

“Imagine this in the future,” he said. “AI agents have already … triaged the overnight intelligence for you. They’ve highlighted the most relevant operational developments, and they’re also combining and collating the intelligence reporting for you to review as you drink your morning coffee.” 

For now, Soong said the CIA’s next AI push centers on deploying smaller models and AI agents at the tactical edge so officers in remote or hostile environments can use AI with little or no connectivity.