The war of three days
launched by the Russians in February 2022, almost a thousand days ago, has everything of a fiasco. Initial territorial gains, in northern and southern Ukraine, were lost; The Russian army is experiencing unprecedented bleeding since the Second World War and the indomitable Ukrainians supported by the West continue to stand up to it.
However, more than 18% of Ukrainian territory, if we include Crimea and the sectors of Donbass already in Russian hands since 2014, now escape kyiv’s control. Furthermore, the insane efforts of the Russian army are currently allowing it to nibble away at swaths of eastern Ukraine. During each of the last weeks, Russian territorial gains to the detriment of the Ukrainians have varied from 160 km2 to 200 km2, estimated the French cartographer who publishes his analyzes on “X” under the name “Flying Chicken”. The objective is to arrive in force at the future negotiating table, especially if the idea of Donald Trump, who has just won the elections which will reopen the doors of the White House in January, is accepted, to impose an end hostilities freezing the front and de facto confirming Russian territorial conquests.
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A triple objective
This is why the Russian government intends to achieve new and precise objectives.
First, drive kyiv’s forces from Russian territory by reconquering the pocket south of Kursk which has been in the hands of the Ukrainians since last August. Hence the suspected deployment of some ten thousand North Korean soldiers alongside the Russians.
Then, multiply the attacks in the East, from Koupiansk (northern Donbass) to Robotyne (southern Donbass), near the large city of Zaporizhia. From north to south, Russian forces are therefore attacking en masse on several axes. One of their objectives is the city of Kupiansk where they attempted an incursion on Wednesday November 13. They also target Sloviansk, Chassiv Yar, Kostiantynivka and Pokrovsk where fierce fighting is bleeding both camps.
Finally, cut off road and rail lines of communication and prevent the arrival of reinforcements and supplies, vital for the defenders of Ukrainian soil. Despite Russian advances, human losses and weariness, the latter still have the support of a majority of the population. Indeed, at 58%, Ukrainians remain opposed to territorial concessions to Russia to obtain peace, according to a poll published Tuesday by the kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).
In an interview broadcast on Saturday, Volodymyr Zelensky recognized a situation “really complicated” on the eastern front before adding: “We must do everything to ensure that this war ends next year. We must end it by diplomatic means. » In a joint declaration on Saturday, the members of the G7 assured to remain “united alongside Ukraine”. For his part, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz asked Russia on Friday to show its “willingness to begin negotiations with Ukraine with a view to a just and lasting peace” according to the German government. An initiative criticized by kyiv but also, on Saturday, by the German conservative opposition which accused it of having contributed to the “propaganda” from Moscow.
