June 5th, 2025: How Ukraine Used Artificial Intelligence To Strike Russia & Russia’s One Million Casualties
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It's Thursday, the 5th of June. Welcome to the President's Daily Brief. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. Alright, let's get briefed. We'll start things off with a story that could mark a turning point in modern warfare and battlefield strategy. Ukraine's devastating drone strike on Russian bombers could be the first time that artificial intelligence has been used to carry out a large-scale military operation.

Later in the show, a new report estimates that nearly one million Russian troops have been killed or wounded in Ukraine. We'll break down the numbers and what they reveal about the true cost of Russia's invasion. Plus, new fallout from the Boulder firebombing. The suspect's entire family has been detained by federal agents and stripped of their visas.

And in today's Back of the Brief, China and Secretary of State Marco Rubio trade sharp words on the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, highlighting the deepening divide between Beijing and Washington. Yeah, the Chinese regime frankly remains very sensitive about that whole brutal suppression of student protests in Tiananmen thing. They hate to be reminded about how they almost lost control of their population.

But first, today's PDB Spotlight We'll begin with an update on Ukraine's drone attack deep in the heart of Russian territory on Sunday and how artificial intelligence played a critical role in making the crippling strikes possible

As we've been reporting, Ukraine's security service, the SBU, used more than 100 drones to strike four Russian military bases simultaneously The attacks damaged a number of Moscow's critical air assets in an embarrassing blow to the Kremlin's strategic bomber capabilities

Now, while the scale of the damage is still being independently assessed, the attack showed a level of sophistication on the part of Ukrainian intelligence that stunned even Kyiv's closest allies, particularly as the drones were assembled and launched from inside Russia, apparently right under the nose of the FSB.

We're now learning that the drone Blitz also leveraged artificial intelligence tools to ensure that they reached their intended targets and successfully detonated even if the remote operator for that drone lost their signal

In a statement on Wednesday, officials with Ukraine's SBU said, quote, During the operation, modern UAV control technology was used, which combines autonomous artificial intelligence algorithms and manual operator intervention, end quote. While each of the 117 drones were reportedly individually piloted by a separate operator, the officials noted that, quote, during the flight,

some drones lost signal and switched to performing a mission using artificial intelligence along a pre-planned route. After approaching and contacting a specifically designated target, the warhead was automatically activated."

Officials with the SBU released new footage on Wednesday as evidence of this significant achievement in modern warfare, which shattered the myth that Moscow's core military assets, including their nuclear delivery systems, are beyond Ukraine's reach.

The videos show the AI-assisted drones hitting the engines, antennas, and wings of multiple long-range bombers and reconnaissance aircrafts at four military airfields located thousands of kilometers inside Russia, including one in Siberia The targeted bases are home to Russia's Strategic Long-Range Bomber Fleet which are frequently used to bombard Ukrainian cities and target critical infrastructure with ballistic and cruise missiles

The SBU reported that 41 Russian aircraft were hit in the strikes, including Tu-95 and Tu-22M3 strategic bombers, both nuclear-capable, as well as A-50 early warning aircraft. Those are basically versions of the U.S. AWACS. They claim that the strikes disabled 34% of Russia's cruise missile bomber fleet and caused roughly $7 billion worth of damage.

Now, as of Wednesday, journalists and open-source intelligence experts using verified video and satellite imagery have only been able to confirm the destruction of 13 aircraft, including 11 strategic bombers, according to reports in Politico and The Washington Post.

As we previously noted, the operation reportedly took 18 months of intensive planning and involved assembling drones from inside Russian territory, supposedly from a site located directly next to an FSB regional headquarters. The drones were then loaded onto container trucks and transported near Russian military airfields by drivers who were unaware of the cargo that they were carrying.

Each container had a retractable false top that opened remotely. Once in place, the drones, armed with precision munitions, were simultaneously unleashed on their targets. Unsurprisingly, the Russian Defense Ministry has downplayed the significance of the attacks, claiming only two of the four airfields targeted by Ukraine were successfully hit.

Now, they said the majority of the drones were repelled and no military or civilian personnel were hurt. The Kremlin released its first official statement on Tuesday, which was similarly muted. A spokesman said the Russian strongman Vladimir Putin had been informed of what they described as a, quote, incident, though added that it was being investigated as an act of terrorism.

Despite their attempts to minimize the attacks, Ukraine's covert operation represents a major embarrassment for the Kremlin and exposed glaring vulnerabilities in Russia's defenses and counterintelligence capabilities

The SBU's ability to infiltrate Russian territory and leverage AI tools to pull off the strikes could rewrite the rules of modern warfare, with an emphasis on precision attacks that degrade key military infrastructure from the inside rather than frontline assaults.

Ukrainian President Zelensky noted Wednesday that Putin could have avoided such an embarrassment if he had only been willing to accept one of several proposals from the U.S. and Kyiv for an unconditional ceasefire. Zelensky said, quote, Had there been a ceasefire before our operation, there'd be no operation.

But Zelensky added that, quote, watching a ceasefire doesn't mean we do nothing in the meantime. He called the Russian bomber fleet an absolutely legitimate military target and said, quote, such operations help counter Russian terror. All right, coming up next, nearly one million Russian troops have reportedly been killed or wounded and new developments in the Boulder terrorist attack on Jews as the suspect's entire family is taken into federal custody.

I'll be right back. Hey, Mike Baker here.

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Welcome back to the PDB Russia's war on Ukraine is grinding toward a staggering toll with military casualties expected to top one million this summer according to a new report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies or CSIS The report from one of the world's leading think tanks states that roughly 250,000 Russian troops have been killed since the launch of Putin's full-scale invasion in February of 2022

When factoring in the wounded, total Russian losses are expected to hit seven figures in the coming months. Ukraine, too, has paid dearly. CSIS estimates 400,000 casualties on the Ukrainian side, including up to 100,000 troops killed in action. Now, CSIS calls the scale of carnage, quote, a stunning and grisly milestone and notes that Russia has now suffered five times more

as many combat deaths as in all post-World War II conflicts combined That sobering tally lines up with Western intelligence estimates suggesting that Moscow loses about 1,000 troops a day killed or wounded

While Putin once tried to frame his so-called special military operation as a defensive necessity, blaming NATO expansion and falsely asserting that Ukraine was never truly sovereign, his opening blitz on Kiev ended in failure. After Ukrainian forces repelled Russia's armored columns in early 2022, the war devolved into a grinding World War I-style trench conflict. Since then, Moscow has leaned heavily on mass infantry assaults

with analysts describing the approach as "meat-grinder warfare," throwing wave after wave of men at fortified Ukrainian positions in pursuit of incremental gains. The results, according to CSIS, have been meager at best. Since January of 2024, Russia has seized just 1,930 square miles of new territory. That's roughly 1% of Ukraine at a pace of just 165 feet

per day. To put that in perspective, it's slower than the famously slow pace of Allied advances during the Battle of the Somme in 1916, which saw daily gains of roughly 260 feet.

The bloodletting continues to escalate overhead. Overnight into Wednesday, Russia launched 95 Iranian-designed drones across Ukraine in one of the deadliest barrages this month, killing at least 10 civilians. Whereas Kyiv over the weekend, as we discussed on Monday's PDB, launched a drone swarm dubbed Operation Spider Web, smuggling over 100 drones into Russian territory via truck and targeting air bases in a bold move that crippled part of Russia's long-range bomber fleet.

Despite the increasingly destructive tit-for-tat, the Kremlin, well, they seem to be betting that they can simply outlast Ukraine. With a larger population and greater industrial output, Putin and some U.S. lawmakers argue that time is on Russia's side. Others aren't so sure.

Former British MI6 chief Richard Dearlove told NBC News that war has become, quote, a disaster for Moscow He warned, quote, from sometime this summer, its capability is all downhill Less armor, less ammunition, less resources, less motivation

Now, mind you, those predictions have been made before, and Putin has shown a willingness over three years to continue his grinding effort. Dearlove added that the Russian offensive will continue, driven by what he called Putin's inability to have a reverse gear on policy.

Meanwhile, the diplomatic front continues to look bleak Two rounds of U.S.-brokered peace talks in Istanbul have stalled Russia is demanding Ukraine's unconditional surrender and future neutrality And those are terms that Kyiv considers a capitulation in disguise Turning stateside

The fallout from the pro-Israel rally firebombing in Colorado is widening as federal authorities have now taken the terror suspect's entire family into custody and revoked their visas. Federal officials have confirmed that the wife and five children of Mohamed Sabri Solomon, the Egyptian national accused of carrying out the terror attack, now face deportation. Senior officials within the Department of Homeland Security, DHS,

and also ICE say the family is being processed for expedited removal. A senior State Department official emphasized the move was in line with national security policy, telling Fox News, quote, "...the Secretary did exactly what he said he would, support the administration's objective of getting terrorists and their family members out of America."

As the federal probe deepens, new details are surfacing about Solomon's path to the U.S. He first entered the U.S. in August of 2022 on a temporary visa through Los Angeles International Airport.

Though authorized to remain until February of 2023, well, he never left. Instead, he filed an asylum application that September and secured work authorization through March of 2025. But prosecutors alleged that Solomon wasn't looking to build a life, but instead was plotting a massacre. As we've been

Tracking this week on the PDB, he allegedly spent over a year preparing Sunday's attack in Boulder, where he hurled a Molotov cocktail and unleashed a makeshift flamethrower crafted from a weed sprayer on a crowd of peaceful pro-Israel demonstrators. Eyewitnesses say he shouted, quote, Free Palestine as flames engulfed the rally. Twelve people were injured in the terror attack, with no deaths reported.

When taken into custody, Solomon stated his intentions were to, quote, "...kill all Zionist people."

The list of charges against him is extensive, with 16 counts of attempted first-degree murder, two counts of using an incendiary device, and 16 additional counts of attempted use of such a weapon. Prosecutors say that if convicted on all counts and sentenced consecutively, he could face a maximum of 624 years in prison. That should do it. But the scope of the investigation has widened beyond Solomon himself.

In a post on X, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said her department is actively reviewing whether members of Solomon's family had foreknowledge of the plot. She posted, "Muhammad's despicable actions will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law," adding that investigators are determining "to what extent his family may have been complicit."

Now, the Boulder firebombing is only the latest example in a sharp uptick of ideologically motivated violence on U.S. soil against Jews in the wake of Hamas's 7 October 2023 terror attack on Israel According to the Anti-Defamation League, over 10,000 anti-Semitic incidents have been reported in the U.S. since that day

Ted Deutch, CEO of the American Jewish Committee, drew a direct line between the Solomon case and a growing trend of anti-Jewish violence. Noting the firebombing came just weeks after another assailant, also shouting, quote, free Palestine, gunned down two Israeli embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington, D.C. He told ABC News, quote, this is a war against people who support Israel. It's a war against the Jewish people, and nobody should tolerate it, end quote.

At the same time, anti-Muslim hate is also apparently surging The Council on American Islamic Relations says it has fielded more than 8,600 complaints so far since 2024 That would be the highest number that they've ever recorded As federal agents work to unravel the extent of Solomon's network and motivations officials say they're bracing for the possibility of more attacks driven by imported ideologies

All right, coming up next in the back of the brief, the 36 years, 36 years after Tiananmen Square, Beijing, well, they're still trying to erase it. And Senator Marco Rubio, well, he's not letting them. More on that when we come back.

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In today's Back of the Brief, it's been 36 years since the Chinese Communist Party, the CCP, sent tanks and troops into Tiananmen Square to crush a student-led protest movement demanding political reform Now, to this day, Beijing continues to deny or distort and censor the events of June 4th, 1989

As a side note, I was in Southeast Asia when Tiananmen happened, and the Chinese regime's crackdown was nothing short of brutal. At the same time, the regime's fear of losing control of the population was palpable in the region. It was the closest that they had come since their revolution to losing power.

On Tuesday night, U.S. Senator Marco Rubio issued a statement marking the anniversary, saying, "...the world will never forget," and condemning the CCP for actively working to bury the truth. He went on to say, "...the courage of those who stood in Tiananmen Square reminds us that freedom, democracy, and self-rule are not just American principles. They are human principles that the CCP cannot erase."

Now, Beijing wasted no time firing back, as you might imagine China's foreign ministry accused Rubio of maliciously distorting the facts And interfering in China's internal affairs How dare you disrupt our efforts to erase a brutal crackdown How dare you Officials say they lodged a formal diplomatic complaint with the U.S. Ooh, look at that The Chinese government's official line remains unchanged Basically silence and suppression

In the lead-up to the anniversary each year, Beijing locks down access to Tiananmen Square, detains potential dissidents, and scrubs the internet of any mention of what happened there. This year was no different. Photos from Wednesday show security forces stationed across the square while the public was kept at a distance.

The actual death toll from the 1989 brutal crackdown remains unknown. Hundreds, perhaps more than a thousand, were killed as tanks opened fire on unarmed demonstrators. The iconic image of a lone protester standing in front of a column of tanks remains one of the most enduring photos of the 20th century. But in China, well, it's almost impossible to find. And that's the point. The CCP wants the world to forget. And that's...

not something that should be allowed to ever happen.

And that, my friends, is the President's Daily Brief for Thursday, the 5th of June. Now, if you have any questions or comments, please reach out to me at pdbatthefirsttv.com. And to listen to the show ad-free, you know you can do that, and you also know it's very simple. Just become a premium member of the President's Daily Brief by visiting pdbpremium.com. I'm Mike Baker, and I'll be back later today with the PDB Afternoon Bulletin. Until then, stay informed, stay safe, stay cool.