The winter offensive of the Russian army in Kharkiv and Donetsk regions has failed, writes Julian Repke, a correspondent for the German newspaper Bild, in a publication entitled "Thousands of soldiers dead, Putin's winter offensive has failed."
"Apart from the deaths of thousands of their own soldiers and the loss of more than 400 armored vehicles, they have achieved nothing," the journalist writes.
According to Repke, who refers to the latest videos from the battlefield, Russia is "almost as far from its strategic goals – the capture of Kupyansk in Kharkiv region and Avdiivka in Donetsk region – as it was at the beginning of these winter campaigns last October."
According to the journalist, to the north of Avdiivka, Russian troops cannot cross the railroad near the village of Stepove.
"Every day they are being destroyed by Ukrainian kamikaze drones and Bradley infantry fighting vehicles," Repke notes.
Despite thousands of dead soldiers and hundreds of lost armored vehicles, the Russian military has not advanced a kilometer to realize its goal of surrounding and capturing Avdiivka, he continues.
North of Kupyansk, Russian troops are bogged down near the small village of Sinkivka.
"Here, too, one Kremlin tank unit after another drives into the same minefield, losing up to 100% of its vehicles and subsequently many soldiers who are attacked by Ukrainian drones," the publication says.
Repke believes that for now, Russian massive attacks have stopped. While in October, November, and December thousands of soldiers and hundreds of pieces of equipment were involved in the offensive, for about a week now, only smaller clashes have been taking place on the battlefield, the journalist writes.
"Russia probably needs to gather reserves before it can resume the offensive," he continues.
At the same time, the Bild author notes:
"It remains unclear how long Ukraine will be able to sustain such a vigorous defense and how much ammunition it will have left."
He also recalls that the United States has recently made it clear that the level of its support for Ukraine will decrease significantly in the future.
Background. The New York Times recently reported on a report from the Zaporizhzhia region, where the Ukrainian military is barely holding back the Russian army's offensive. The authors of this publication wrote about the events at the front with much less optimism from the point of view of Ukraine's position.