Russia Summer Offensive Continues; Oreshnik Warning Active Through G7 Window; Trump Attention Swings Back to Ukraine
Russian forces continued overnight long-range strikes against Ukraine through Thursday morning. The Institute for the Study of War maintains that Vladimir Putin’s decree expanding the Russian armed forces will not affect the battlefield situation. The CIA Saturday-night Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile warning remains in active operational effect. With the Iran deal formally signed, the Australian Financial Review reports Trump’s attention is swinging back to Ukraine; Ukrainian momentum in Congress and on the battlefield is forcing the four-year-old war back onto the White House agenda. Russia has not formally responded to the Zelensky US-soil meeting proposal.
The Trump “Moscow deal could be next” framing combined with the swift-return-of-Russian-oil-sanctions threat is the structural carrot-and-stick US pressure architecture on Russia. The Iran-framework formal signing late Wednesday materially reduces Russia’s strategic-leverage position on global energy markets through the Hormuz reopening. The Ukrainian Moscow-refinery strikes this week compound the structural Russian-side pressure heading into any Trump-Moscow engagement window. The CIA Oreshnik warning has stretched past the 24-48 hour window without operationalising; the warning remains active through the G7 implementation phase.