After 3 months, Russia still bogged down in Ukraine war

Some of those forces apparently were redeployed to the Donbas, but it wasn’t enough to tip the scales on the battlefield.“They really had to thin out the troops they had around Kharkiv, simply because they’re trying to hold to too much of a line with too few troops,” said Phillips O’Brien, professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.The Donbas fighting has increasingly morphed into artillery duels, and “it might go on for quite a long time without much movement in the lines,” he said.“So it will be a more of a positional battle at that point, O’Brien added, with success going to whoever “can take the pounding.”Ukraine, meanwhile, continues to get a steady flow of Western weapons, including U.S. howitzers and drones, tanks from Poland and other heavy gear that is immediately sent into combat.“Ukraine’s plan is simple and obvious — wear down the Russian forces in the nearest months as much as possible, win time for receiving Western weapons and training how to use them, and then launch a counteroffensive in the southeast,” said Sunhurovskyi, the Kyiv-based military expert.He said Ukraine hopes to receive even more powerful Western weapons, such as U.S. HIMARS multiple rocket launchers, anti-ship missiles and more potent air defense weapons.The eastern deadlock has angered hard-liners in Russia, who warned that Moscow can’t win if it doesn’t conduct a massive mobilization and concentrate all of its resources in a decisive attack.Igor Strelkov, a former security officer who led the separatists in Donbas in 2014, denounced what he described as the Kremlin’s indecision, saying it could pave the way for defeat.“For Russia, the strategic deadlock is deepening,” he said.Ukrainian authorities, meanwhile, are increasingly emboldened by the slow pace of the Russian offensive and growing Western support.While Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reaffirmed last week that pushing the Russians back to their pre-invasion positions would represent a victory, some of his aides declared even more ambitious goals.Adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said Ukraine isn’t interested in a cease-fire “until Russia is ready to fully liberate occupied territories,” a bold statement that appears to reflect hopes for reclaiming the Donbas and Crimea.Russia, meanwhile, apparently aims to bleed Ukraine by methodically striking fuel supplies and infrastructure while making grinding military gains in the east.