It was to be the turning point of the counteroffensive, the attack that could overturn the outcome of the war in the face of an enemy Russia weakened by heroic Ukrainian resistance. That’s not how it happened. Or at least not in the way Kiev, NATO, the European Union and, above all, the United States had hoped. The front in Donbass remains essentially unchanged compared to this spring, when the troops of Volodymyr Zelensky They tried to overthrow the front. Now there are more and more sources that are starting to whisper it. For Jens Stoltenberg “the situation on the battlefield is difficult”. For Joseph Borrell, European support, however “unwavering,” lacks a “sense of urgency.” And me DeliveriesLike the fighter jets, they are arriving slowly: Brussels had promised to have them at the beginning of 2024, but from Berlin they keep repeating that it will be impossible to keep up with deliveries.
Today it is the president himself who admits the difficulties with an air of sincerity that does not appear – for the first time – as an attempt to persuade the world to give Kiev more military equipment. With the arrival of winter, says the President, The war has entered “a new phase.”. The fighting is made more difficult by the snow and the counteroffensive must be slowed down at all costs. Zelensky’s troops lack weapons, ammunition and, above all, ground troops. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, 125,000 soldiers have died since the attack began, reducing the Ukrainian army’s combat capability. Perhaps they will be inflated numbers, just like the over 300,000 Russian soldiers that Kiev supposedly killed, but – apart from the precise dates – the deep meaning does not change: things are not going right. “We are not retreating, I am satisfied,” Zelenskyy says half-heartedly in an interview with the Associated Press, but admits that “we are losing people” and that “we didn’t have all the weapons we wanted.” Ukraine hoped for a “quicker” victory, but did not achieve “the desired results.” And that is “a fact”.
Officially, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba reiterated at the last NATO summit that no one wants to “give up” and that the goal remains “the recapture of territories up to the 1991 borders.” But a years-long conflict looms, a time in which NATO will have to deal with a Russia that has already entered a real war economy. Nothing the West can’t handle, you just have to know it. “It is unlikely that the Ukrainians can do this Drive out the Russians from all occupied territories as early as 2024,” a senior NATO official with access to intelligence reports told ANSA in recent days. The target has already been pushed back to 2025, and Moscow now sees the upper hand: “We see no reason to review our plans,” Lavrov said at his meetings in recent days. Because peace negotiations would now be politically impossible for Kiev, as it would have nothing to claim and put on the table.
That’s not the only problem. The Ukrainian president has to deal with three new developments at the political level. The first is an internal question: the disagreements between the military wing close to the general are now well known Valery Zaluzhny, and Zelensky’s magic circle. Then there is the case of the poisonings that have affected the highest office of Ukrainian intelligence: the fact that internal or external enemies managed to get hold of the wife of the Gur commander, Kyrylo Budanovprovides a simple understanding of the military difficulties facing Kiev. Finally, the conflict between Israel and Hamas. The USA and Europe assure that international support will not be lacking despite the Gaza war. But Zelensky is aware that “the consequences of the international community’s change in orientation due to the tragedy in the Middle East” are already becoming visible. “Only the blind don’t notice,” complains the president, “attention equals help: lack of attention means lack of help.” Not to mention that there will be a vote in the United States soon and the mood towards Kiev could change. Radical.
Giuseppe De Lorenzo, December 1, 2023
Did you like this article? also read
Follow us on our channels