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The Gazans must have felt the umbrage as international media spotlights shifted to Tehran and Tel Aviv after the Israelis performed their sneak attack on Iranian military and infrastructure in mid-June. For the embattled Ukrainian army, it’s a feeling they must be comfortable with now, as they enter the fifty-first month of their defense against Russia.
Returning to the headlines briefly after Donald Trump’s tenure began with a flurry of negotiations between Ukraine and Russia, a breakdown of relations between the parties saw focus directed towards Israel. Now, Ukrainian defenders are facing incursions in three regions, including Dnipropetrovsk, which had not then seen combat in the war.
They are still repelling Russian attacks against the last major Ukrainian position in Donetsk Oblast, Pekrovsk, and they’re fighting to the north in the Sumy Oblast, where Russia has claimed over 200 square kilometers of territory to create a buffer zone along the border with the Russian region of Kursk.
Wall Street Journal reports that Russia has amassed 50,000 soldiers just 12 miles away from the Sumy capital city; Kyiv Independent reports that they have 110,000 around Pokrovsk, which they continue to strike with drones and artillery. Though denied as misinformation by the Ukrainian government, a town called Dachnoye has been taken by Russian forces entering Dnipropetrovsk according to Russian state media, the first time this region has seen conflict.
It’s part of what analysts and officers interviewed by Kyiv Independent describe as a new tactic employed by Russia of using their extra manpower to poke in many different directions. Oleksandr Syrskiy, Ukraine’s top military commander, has said that the front line has expanded to almost 750 miles—longer than the Italian Peninsula. 100 miles has been added just this half year, as Russia seeks to identify weak points in Ukraine’s defenses and push in to force the Ukrainians to reorganize and potentially open up other weak points elsewhere.
Despite this, which WSJ described as “whack-a-mole,” the primary objective is clearly finding the best moment to launch an assault upon Pokrovsk, which WaL has reported previously is both almost surrounded and the most significant Ukrainian defensive position left in what is known as the Donbas, the part of Ukraine that is ethnically Russian.
Bit by bit
The Russian advance has been extremely fast by the standards of the war so far. 943 square kilometers have been taken in just the two months to leading up to June 28, Russian media claimed.
They’ve secured around half of the territory surrounding Pokrovsk, their major objective in the region.
State-controlled news in Kyiv says the city is one of many in Donestk, and would not amount to a significant trophy if Russia were to claim it. That can be reasonably said to be incorrect, as not only would controlling it grant access to a key crossroads of highway access for Russian forces, but it would mean Kyiv loses access to its last mine of coking coal in the nation, which is currently in high demand for steel production.
WaL reported that before any assault on Pokrovsk, which British intelligence analysts recently estimated would take months to carry out based on prior evidence from Bakhmut and Avdiivka, they would need to gain a partial encirclement of Pokrovsk itself, which would also take months.
Since then, Russia has made significant advances around the city. In the Sumy region, to the north of Pokrovsk, the 200 square kilometers claimed by Russian forces would put the capital city of the same name within range of some of the larger artillery pieces.
“What they can do is put heavy pressure on the Sumy direction and try to gain as much land as possible, in order to bring Sumy into range of artillery and drones, tying Ukrainian troops into defensive battles and giving Russia some leverage in upcoming negotiations,” said Emil Kastehelmi, a Finnish military analyst and member of the Black Bird Group open-source intelligence collective.
Kyiv Independent said also that the space between Russian forces and the borders of Dnipropetrovsk region amount to around a 2 kilometer-long no man’s land.
Help not forthcoming
The US has supplied Ukraine with over $100 billion in weapons and financing since the war began. Apart from $3.2 billion in remaining Presidential Drawdown Authority that hasn’t been used, there is no US aid left for the country. Ukraine still has stockpiles of previously-received weaponry, but these will not last very long if Pokrovsk becomes embedded in a siege.
Since the fallout from the fiery Oval Office standoff between Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance, and Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, there haven’t been any discussions about weapons transfers or aid deals. Trump became cross with Kyiv and Moscow for stalling discussions, and Russia has not moved from its negotiating positions that Ukraine must demilitarize and hand over possession of the Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kherson regions which Russia “annexed” at the start of the war.
The Independent reported that in early June, Washington redirected 20,000 anti-drone missiles intended for Ukraine to the Middle East.
Trump has previously said that if Russia did not make some headway in discussions with the US, existing economic sanctions could be stiffened, and new ones applied. However, in the same way that Ukraine has gradually found ways to circumvent a lack of US military aid—particularly through its production of drones, the Russian economy has long since adapted to Western sanctions. WaL
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PICTURED ABOVE: Trump meeting Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Emanual Macron in Paris, February 2025 PC: Office of the President of Ukraine
