Ukrainians continue to struggle with a lack of military aid. But the American one was approved. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin revealed why the Ukrainians are still losing ground.
It is said to be too early for the effects of American aid on the Ukrainian front lines. It is still “very early” to see improvements on the front lines after the first batch of US weapons began flowing into Ukraine, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told senators on May 8. The Pentagon chief said he and Defense Minister Rust Umerov discuss Ukraine’s “most critical needs” every week.
In the words of the US Secretary of Defense the Kyiv Independent server pointed out.
Ukraine is facing a “new stage” of all-out war as Russia prepares to expand its offensive, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on May 3.
Same the server warned that The Russians advanced near Krasnohorivka, but their advance was blocked at a local factory, Nazar Voloshyn, a spokesman for the Chortytsia group, told Army TV on May 8. Krasnohorivka is roughly 30 kilometers west of the occupied city of Donetsk, and Russian forces tried unsuccessfully to penetrate the settlement after the fall of Avdijivka in late February. According to him, the city is “under the full control” of the Ukrainian Defense Forces. “(Russian soldiers) are still there. The enemy is cut off from the supply of ammunition,” said the spokesperson of the Ukrainian army.
Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence service (HUR), said Ukraine should expect to face a renewed Russian offensive in the late spring or early summer, with the offensive intensifying in the eastern Donbas region.
Military strategist Edward Luttwak wrote on May 4 that Russia may throw more troops into Ukraine. “This arithmetic is inevitable: NATO countries will soon have to send troops to Ukraine or accept a catastrophic defeat,” he noted. Kyiv Post drew attention to his words, saying that the European Union has more defense dollars and the same number of “active” military personnel as Russia (an estimated 1.1 million in Europe versus 1 million in Russia, according to armforces.eu).
“If Europe cannot provide enough troops, Russia will win on the battlefield, and even if diplomacy successfully intervenes to avoid a total debacle, Russian military power will return triumphantly to Central Europe,” Luttwak wrote. “At that point, the Western European powers will have to rebuild their armed forces, whether they like it or not, starting with the return of conscription,” he continued.
But Lt. Gen. (ret.) Ben Hodges, former commander of US Army Europe, believes that Russia cannot win because Russia has suffered too many losses and Ukraine and Europe just need time to mobilize forces, industrial and physical.
French President Macron spoke about sending troops to Ukraine. The Poles are ready to provide space for American nuclear weapons if both governments agree to deploy them.
Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonyte said that the Lithuanian government has granted Lithuania permission to send soldiers to Ukraine for training missions in the future. During an interview with the Financial Times (FT) published on May 8, Šimonyte said that Ukraine did not request the Lithuanian troops and noted that Russia would likely consider the deployment of Lithuanian troops to Ukraine a provocation. The Washington-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) also quoted from the interview.
Šimonyte said that if Europe only considered Russia’s response to human and material aid to Ukraine, Europe would send nothing, stating that “every other week you hear that someone (in Russia) is going to detonate a nuclear weapon”.
The reality is that the Russians are advancing. The Washington Institute for the Study of War (ISW) noted that the Russians had achieved significant tactical successes in the Avdijivka area.
“Geolocation images released on May 8 show that Russian forces have recently advanced 4 km north of Ocheretyne towards the eastern edge of Novooleksandrivka (NW of Avdijivka and Ocheretyne) and that Ukraine is not holding positions on the NW edge of Ocheretyne,” the institute pointed out.
In addition, Russian missile and drone attacks on energy infrastructure and civilian objects continue. Ukrainian Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko announced that Russian forces had struck electricity production and transmission facilities in Poltava, Kirovohrad, Zaporozhye, Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and Vinnytsia Oblasts. Ukraine’s largest private energy operator DTEK announced that Russian forces attacked three unspecified thermal power plants (TPPs) in Ukraine, severely damaging unspecified facilities. Russia’s Ministry of Defense (MoD) said it targeted Ukrainian energy facilities and defense industrial enterprises to reduce Ukraine’s ability to produce military equipment and transfer Western material to the front line.
According to ISW, the losses in these attacks are so great that Russia will not be able to replenish them for many years.
The British think tank International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) reported on February 12 that Russia is likely to be able to sustain its current rate of vehicle losses (over 3,000 armored fighting vehicles per year) for at least two or three years primarily by reactivating vehicles from storage. The IISS also estimates that Russia lost over 3,000 armored fighting vehicles in 2023 and almost 8,000 armored fighting vehicles as of February 2022, and that Russia has likely reactivated at least 1,180 main battle tanks and about 2,470 infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers taken out of storage .
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Ukraine (War in Ukraine)
Reports from the battlefield are difficult to verify in real time, regardless of whether they come from any side of the conflict. Both warring parties, for understandable reasons, may release completely or partially false (misleading) information.
PL editorial content discussing this conflict can be found on this page.
war in Ukraine
Reports from the battlefield are difficult to verify in real time, regardless of whether they come from any side of the conflict. Both warring parties, for understandable reasons, may release completely or partially false (misleading) information.
You can find brief information regarding this conflict updated by ČTK several times an hour on this page. PL editorial content discussing this conflict can be found on this page.
author: Miloš Polák
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