Victory Chronicles-DAY 1262

The White House is working to hold trilateral talks between U.S. President Donald Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Kremlin ruler Vladimir Putin, according to sources cited by Ukrainian public broadcaster Suspilne.

The talks, which seek to end the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian war that Moscow instigated, could take place as early as next week, though a location has not yet been finalized. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that Trump is open to meeting both leaders.

“As President Trump stated yesterday, the Russians have expressed interest in meeting with him, and the president is open to that,” Leavitt said. “President Trump would like to meet with both President Putin and President Zelenskyy because he wants this brutal war to end.”

She added that the White House is currently working out the logistics of the possible meetings and will release more details in the near future.

Ukrainian Intelligence: Russian state revenue sinks by nearly $17 billion amid falling oil prices. Russia’s federal budget has lost almost $17 billion in revenue from the oil and gas sector between January and July 2025, a 19 percent plunge compared to the same period last year, according to Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service.

The main drivers behind the loss include falling global oil prices, a stronger ruble, and a sharp decline in gas exports to the European Union.

The average price for Russia’s benchmark Urals crude fell by 18.4 percent to $60.37 per barrel. At the same time, the ruble appreciated 45 percent since the start of the year, from $113.71 to $81.25. Gas exports to the EU dropped by 50 percent, down to 9.93 billion cubic meters.

In response, the Russian government has slashed fuel subsidies to oil companies through a so-called “fuel damper” mechanism. The Finance Ministry also downgraded its 2025 oil and gas revenue forecast to $104.4 billion — 24 percent lower than its previous estimate of $137.3 billion.

Drone strike sparks fire at office building in Kharkiv, injuring two civilians. A Russian drone hit a civilian enterprise in the Saltivskyi district of Kharkiv late on Aug. 7, sparking a fire that engulfed the roof and top floor of a four-story office building. The fire spread across 500 square meters [5,380 square feet] before being extinguished, according to Ukraine’s State Emergency Service (SES).

Two civilians — a man born in 1959 and a woman born in 1962 — suffered acute stress reactions and received medical attention. No serious injuries were reported. Fifty firefighters and 13 units of specialized equipment, including an explosives disposal team, were involved in the response.

Ukrainian troops deploy ground robot to evacuate wounded soldier. Ukraine’s 118th Mechanized Brigade released a video that shows how soldiers used a ground robotic system to evacuate a wounded comrade from the front line.

According to the brigade, operators from the 2nd Company of the 23rd Rifle Battalion successfully transported the wounded soldier using the unmanned ground vehicle (UGV). The unit did not disclose the time or location of the operation, citing security concerns. The footage is presented as another example of how modern technology is helping save lives on the battlefield.

Key Takeaways:

• U.S. and Russian officials continue to provide updates about a possible meeting between US President Donald Trump and Kremlin ruler Vladimir Putin in the near future, but exact details remain uncertain.
• Putin may have used his meeting with Witkoff to propose a long-range strikes moratorium, which would allow Russia to stockpile long-range drones and missiles and renew devastating large-scale strikes against Ukraine after the moratorium expires. A strike moratorium will also handicap Ukraine’s ability to continue its long-range strike campaign aimed at attriting the Russian defense industrial base and wartime economy.
• Russia has significantly scaled up its drone and missile production in 2025, allowing Russia to rapidly increase the size of its strike packages that it launches against Ukraine.
• Putin likely claimed to Witkoff that Russia’s territorial ambitions are limited to the seizure of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson oblasts. Putin is likely attempting to frame Russia’s seizure of the four oblasts as inevitable in order to push Ukraine and the West to capitulate to Kremlin demands.
• Russia’s occupation of the four oblasts is neither inevitable nor imminent, as Russian forces will face serious operational obstacles in what are likely to be multi-year endeavors.
• Russian objectives are not limited to the occupation of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson oblasts, however, despite Kremlin attempts to frame Russia’s war aims as such in an effort to make its demands seem more reasonable. Russia has not abandoned its more extensive, original war aims.
• Putin’s war aims are also not limited to territory.
• The Kremlin is engaged in a delicate balancing act between feigning interest in negotiations to Trump and conditioning Russian society to accept nothing short of Putin’s desired full victory in Ukraine, no matter how long it takes.
• Russian forces advanced in the Toretsk direction and likely completed the seizure of Toretsk.

Oleh Apostol, a Ukrainian brigadier general and commander of the Ukrainian Airborne Assault Forces, spoke about the attitude of Ukrainian soldiers toward the Russian civilian population during last year’s Kursk Operation:

“In autumn 2024, Glavkom published several articles about the work of the military commandant’s office in Kursk and the attitude of our soldiers towards the civilian population: they helped with medicine and food, transported a woman in labour to Sumy to give birth, and even delivered stoves to every house in the autumn, walking around the yards and talking kindly. Obviously, there is a mental difference between the Ukrainian and Russian military. At the same time, surely there was an order to all units not to touch civilians or loot?

Of course, there was an order from senior commanders and brigade commanders. I know 100 percent  that none of my guys touched the locals. My guys are all decent people, they have no evil in them. God forbid, if I found out that something like that had happened, all the commanders would be fired and the guilty ones would immediately go to prison.

What the Russians said afterwards, that the Ukrainian military was stealing, is clearly an informational and psychological special operation aimed purely at the Russian audience. They fabricate propaganda following Goebbels’ example of ‘crucified boys’ and so on, and their people will ‘buy’ it.

Ukraine has a lot of evidence of people being shot, tortured, and abused by Russians in the territories they occupy. The Russians don’t have such evidence (inhumane treatment of the civilian population in Kursk – Glavkom), because there was no such thing – they don’t even have anything to film.

The way the Russians behaved in our occupied territories is their style and mentality. Analyze how they behaved in Georgia or Chechnya”.

• EU dismayed that Trump has not put “a single iota of pressure” on Putin
• US State Department on Trump-Putin potential meeting: Not a question of trust, but of actions
• Russian occupiers seriously damage Ukrainian Patriot radar, but it is repaired in Germany
• Zelenskyy stresses Europe’s role in peace talks with Russia
• Ukrainian drone hits radar of Russia’s latest S-500 air defence missile system