One of the most respected Western military analysts, Michael Coffman of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that Western countries are increasingly inclined to believe that Russia's war against Ukraine will be long and will not be ended by one successful operation of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, BBC reports.
In the latest episode of the War On the Rocks podcast, Coffman assessed the first results of the Ukrainian Armed Forces' counteroffensive in southern Ukraine, during which Ukrainian troops managed to break through Russian defenses in almost four months, but have not yet been able to achieve convincing success and liberate significant territory.
The expert believes that earlier in the West, some believed that "this offensive would allow Ukraine to negotiate from a relative position of strength, and that it would persuade Russia to negotiate."
"That view, while not completely abandoned, is largely on the back burner," Kofman said, "and people realize that this is going to be a long war, that the potential quick fixes to make it shorter are a thing of the past. And the main planning should now focus on a longer conflict, which, like all wars, will have different phases."
The Ukrainian army has apparently managed to break through the Russian defense line near the village of Robotyno, but Kofman is not yet inclined to call it a decisive breakthrough. He says that the Ukrainian army is "widening the gap" in the Russian defense, but so far its scale does not allow us to talk about a breakthrough that could come if the Ukrainian army manages to bring in a significant number of armored vehicles and create serious problems for the Russian troops.
The deterioration of the weather this fall, although not a decisive factor that could stop the Ukrainian counteroffensive, will be important. According to Coffman, the Ukrainian military operates in small infantry groups for which off-road conditions are not a serious obstacle, but if the Ukrainian armed forces want to build on their success quickly, they will need to introduce armored vehicles that depend on relatively firm ground.
The possible provision of ATACMS ballistic missiles to Ukraine would help the Ukrainian Armed Forces, but it would not be decisive either. The analyst believes that if the Ukrainian military does receive a variant of this missile with a cluster rather than an explosive warhead, it will help Kyiv hit more Russian targets.
Background. It has been reported that NATO will send AWACS surveillance aircraft to Lithuania to monitor Russian military activity.