Ukraine Opens Donetsk ‘Vivaldi’ Offensive as Energy Strikes Undercut Trump Ceasefire Claim

Ukrainian forces have opened a new offensive in northern Donetsk even as overnight drone and missile exchanges undercut President Donald Trump’s claim that Moscow and Kyiv had agreed to pause strikes on each other’s energy infrastructure, Reuters and NBC News reported on September 15, 2026.

Brigadier-General Andrii Biletskyi, who has commanded Ukraine’s defence in the area since last month, said the Third Army Corps launched an operation he named “Vivaldi” north of the so-called fortress belt cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. In a Telegram video cited by Reuters, Biletskyi said his troops had cleared about 75 square kilometres (29 square miles) of Russian infiltration groups, recaptured a further 10 square kilometres, disrupted logistics, cleared three villages and the area around a fourth, and fully secured the village of Serednie. Reuters stressed it could not independently verify the claims and noted that drone warfare has created a wide no-man’s-land “kill zone” that makes lines of control hard to confirm from afar.

The battlefield announcement landed on the same news cycle as a fresh night of energy and infrastructure attacks. NBC News, citing Ukrainian officials, reported that Russia fired a volley of about 200 drones that hit energy and port facilities; in Kyiv, local authorities said one person was killed and seven others injured in attacks on two gas stations, warehouses and other sites. Ukraine’s military said it struck the Syzran oil refinery in Russia’s Samara region and reported additional hits on a drone production facility in Taganrog and a drone preparation and launch site in the Oryol region.

Trump had said Monday that the two sides agreed to halt energy strikes, framing the aerial exchange as a driver of record U.S. diesel prices, NBC reported. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appeared to question whether any firm deal existed, saying he would only promise to halt energy strikes if Russia did the same and that he did not trust the Kremlin to comply. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, per NBC, called Trump’s idea “a very good idea, a good initiative” while describing it as a proposal still being discussed with Washington. The White House did not immediately clarify what, if anything, had been locked in.

Donetsk remains the focal point of Russia’s territorial demands and of stalled diplomacy that U.S. envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff have tried to restart with visits to Moscow and Kyiv this month, Reuters noted. Russia’s advances have slowed this year overall, but its forces have pressed from the south and infiltrated deeper into Kostiantynivka. For readers tracking both the map and the energy war, Tuesday’s twin stories are the same conflict told in two registers: a local counterpunch around the fortress belt, and a night of infrastructure strikes that immediately tested Trump’s ceasefire narrative.