Russia’s Battering Ram Strategy and It’s Mission in the Donbas: Is Russia Reviving It’s Operational Art?
Introduction
The war for the Donbas continues despite Ukraine’s ongoing operations in the Kursk region. Russia’s military battering ram continues its westward advance. In response, Ukraine’s political and military leadership launched a successful operation in the Kursk region of Russia, but the situation there is becoming critical and can turn the entire war into a completely different direction. It seems that Moscow has trapped Ukraine in a counter-propulsion, creating several simultaneous operational challenges. This operational dilemma could easily evolve into a strategic one in the coming months because Moscow has placed the Ukrainian military command in a situation that requires addressing several dialectical tasks. If Ukraine doesn’t find the solutions for these challenges, it seems that the war will enter into the dangerous stage of constant retreat of Ukraine. Otherwise, these challenges may eventually necessitate a more significant intervention from Ukraine’s allies to shift the dynamics of the war in the near future.
The first operational dilemma for the Ukrainian Stavka is the need to maintain two distant, large theaters: Kursk and the Donbas. The second challenge is the emergence of a front-type formation in the southern area of the Donbas, which combines old Soviet military traditions with modern Western concepts such as A2/AD (anti-access/area denial) and network-centric warfare. Third, is the deployment of the Northern Korean forces to the Kursk region.
If Ukraine fails to find effective solutions to these two dilemmas, they could easily evolve into strategic-level problems. Additionally, there remains the possibility of Russia opening new hotspots along the over 1,000-kilometer front line, such as a renewed offensive in the Kherson region or concentrating their efforts in Zaporozhe region. Even without newfronts, Ukraine is already facing operational-level threats, and it must be emphasized that this dilemma has the potential to escalate to a strategic level. An additional problem for the Ukrainian command is the continued redeployment of some of its best units, in terms of age, experience, and concentration of armored vehicles, to the Kursk region instead of consolidating reserves in the Donbas.
At the strategic level, this situation may require immediate intervention from Ukraine’s allies to stabilize the situation. The discussion about the deployment of NATO troops in Ukraine is no longer a far-fetched idea but rather a geostrategic consideration over Europe’s strategic depth. A recent example is the debate in Estonia about sending troops to Western Ukraine. The question remains unclear in the West regarding its strategic depth in Eastern Europe, and in particular, what will happen if Russia cannot be stopped in the Donbas, northern Ukraine, or Zaporizhzhia. French President Emmanuel Macron stated that under no circumstances can Odesa and Kyiv fall to the Russians. Thus, there is a substantial debate over Europe’s and NATO’s strategic depth in Eastern Europe. In October 2024, for instance, the Estonian government discussed the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine and the UK also considered sending trainers and military advisers to Ukraine. However, the future of this process will be determined by two key factors: (1) the success of Russia’s battering ram strategy in the Donbas and (2) Ukraine’s ability to hold its positions in the Russia’s Kursk region and in the left-bank Ukraine (that is, the portion of Ukraine that lies on the eastern side of the Dnieper River). This article examines the strategic and operational perspectives of Ukraine’s Kursk operation in correlation with events in the Donbas. Moreover, it proposes two theoretical frameworks that help to explain Russia’s Donbas-centric strategy, namely (1) the kill zone and (2) the battering ram strategy.
The Kursk Operation: From Euphoria to Cold Minded Assessment
According to Kyiv’s calculations, the operation in Kursk aimed to achieve two major strategic goals. The first is political. Kyiv intends to force the Russian government into negotiations on terms favorable to Ukraine. The second is that Ukrainian military operations are intended to disrupt Russian military plans in the Donbas by forcing the Russian military to divert significant reserves away from the Donbas and toward the Kursk region. It seems the ultimate military goal is to secure control over key chokepoints and establish a serious and long-lasting bridgehead inside Russian territory.
Despite these efforts, Moscow has not shifted from its publicly stated primary military objectives, which is the annexation and full incorporation of the Donbas and southern Ukraine into the Russian geopolitical and cultural matrix. It appears that Russian government is willing to sacrifice its own territory to achieve the goal of occupying southern Ukraine. This goal has become a sort of idée fixe for the Kremlin. In response, the Russian military has launched a counteroffensive in the Kursk region to force Ukraine to split its forces between two distant theaters of war. So far, Ukrainian attempts to strike at the rear of Russian forces, aiming to cut logistics and disrupt the Russian offensive, have not been successful.
Unfortunately for Kyiv, the offensive operation in Kursk can produce catastrophic results. Especially if we speak about the upcoming engagement of the Northern Korean Armed Forces in Kursk region. With this operation Ukraine has overextended the front line, depleted reserves of the best-trained and younger forces, drained the supply of armored and motorized vehicles, and expanded the warzone by several hundred additional square kilometers. Although Ukraine continues its operation despite the Russian counteroffensive, the associated risks are now dangerously high. A potential defeat of Ukrainian Armed Forces (AFU) —whether through encirclement or a chaotic withdrawal—would be far more damaging to Ukrainian leadership than the initial surge of emotional support that followed the beginning of the operation.
However, the Kremlin shows no signs of deviating from the declared war goals outlined at the start of the conflict. Russian military tradition calls for a rigid formulation of war goals, and it seems that Moscow will pursue these goals at any cost to achieve its objectives in Ukraine. This does not mean that Ukraine cannot alter these plans, but the end of diplomatic negotiations suggests that we are likely to witness more surprising and dramatic events on the battlefield in the coming months. The major question now concerns the geographic limits of this war. It was previously suggested that Russia is quite satisfied with the war in the Donbas and that they will attempt to primarily confine the war to this region.
Moreover, political declarations from European leaders have made it clear that as long as the war remains confined to the eastern portion of Ukraine, no European soldiers will officially join the fight on Ukraine’s behalf. Despite the high stakes in the Donbas and Kursk, it is unlikely that even a Russian breakthrough in these regions will completely break Ukraine’s resistance. However, it may provide Russia with the operational space they are desperately seeking in the Donbas or in a perfect scenario on the entire left-bank Ukraine.
What remains particularly concerning for Ukraine is that its best forces are tied down in an area more than 300 kilometers away from the battles unfolding in southern Ukraine that truly determine the future of Ukrainian sovereignty. This back-and-forth with reserves is impacting the speed of Russian troops in the Donbas. In addition to the Donbas-Kursk dilemma, the Kursk operation has revealed another significant issue: the vast expansion of the warzone by several thousand square kilometers. This extension requires additional resources, such as air defense systems, electronic warfare, and space intelligence which Ukraine lacks.
In general, it can be concluded that both armies are nearing culmination and perhaps the final stage of the war. The outcome of the Kursk offensive and the situation in the Donbas led us to believe that we were witnessing a decisive, general battle. This battle spanned several, sometimes geographically independent theaters, all of which will play a critical role in determining the course of the war.
It should be noted that when we refer to the war, it pertains to the fixation of the conflict on left bank Ukraine. The penetration of Russian, Belarusian, Northern Korean forces into central or western Ukraine would be considered a new stage of the war. Such a scenario would dramatically change the nature of this conflict, now focusing on the matter of strategic depth of the NATO countries. In these circumstances we should speak about different wars that we are experiencing currently.
The participation of the North Korean forces in the Kursk region has enormous geostrategic importance. First it escalates the war rhythm to the next less controllable stage. Second, the military aspect suggests that the North Korean soldiers likely are going to be deployed to the weakest front in the Kursk region, namely the Sudzha direction to reinforce the Russian positions there. But there is a high level probability that North Korea will send the forces invading sovereign Ukraine territories, not only the Kursk region. Particularly if we take into account the very fact that North Korea recognized the annexation of those territories that were occupied by Russia since 2022. Third, it unifies the knots of belligerence in Eurasia into one intertwined system of global confrontation and can serve as a pillar for the greater level of confrontation in Eurasia than we can imagine.
The New Look on Soviet Military Doctrine “Deep Operation”
After World War I and the Russian Civil War, Joseph Stalin and his generals debated the future of warfare and how to account for positional warfare. This led to the development of the Deep Operations concept. As a result, Russian generals began paying attention to the theories they had studied during their time in Soviet military academies.
The concept aimed to overcome the stalemates of WWI by using mobile armored forces to breach enemy lines and disrupt their rear positions. Technological advancements and the mass production of tanks, planes, and artillery systems led to vast battlefields filled with immense firepower. The basic principle was that despite the concentration of defensive lines, a concentrated force of heavy weaponry—such as tanks, artillery, and aviation—could break through at critical points and penetrate into the operational or strategic rears of the enemy. Russian military tradition defined positional warfare as “the simultaneous suppression of the enemy’s tactical defense throughout its entire depth, followed by a high-speed breakthrough by infantry and tanks, with support from artillery and aviation; a form of combat operations for a formation or unit.”
These theories were implemented throughout WWII and the Cold War, reaching their peak in the 1960s and 70s with the Ogarkov Doctrine, which adapted Deep Operations to meet Cold War demands. It was adaptation of the American military concept of the ISR (intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance) systems and the long-range strike capabilities, precision-guided munitions and other systems into the Soviet military traditions. After the Soviet collapse, Russia sought a smaller, more agile military for “operations,” rather than full-blown wars. However, the prolonged war in Ukraine exposed Russia’s lack of preparation for large-scale, industrial-style warfare. Russian intellectual military thought is once again facing a serious challenge: how to break the positional stalemate that emerged at the end of 2023. In 2024, there was already a debate about using tactical nuclear weapons to resolve the impasse.
The decision of Ukrainian commanders to send troops to neighboring regions of Russia (before the Kursk operation) in cooperation with the AFU and RDK should be seen again as a way to escape the Donbas-centric war and the Kursk operation is culmination of AFUs search of the exit from positional stalemate and the Donbas kill zone.
The Ukrainian military however faces similar challenges as the Russian one. Former Chief of the General Staff Valerii Zaluzhnyi, facing these pessimistic circumstances, found himself compelled to directly engage with the Western military and political establishment through public channels. In his essay, he offers solutions to the strategic impasse that poses a threat to Ukraine. Firstly, Zaluzhnyi acknowledges that, following the failure to achieve a breakthrough on the front, the war has gradually devolved for both sides into positional warfare, which he regards as a trap. Secondly, he asserts that positional warfare favors the Russians over the Ukrainians. Thirdly, he concedes that the Russians are adept at swiftly adapting to every military strategy and tactic implemented by Ukraine and the West thus far. Zaluzhnyi suggests that Ukraine must promptly revert to a more maneuverable style of warfare. To achieve this, the AFU must enhance their current capabilities.
Thus, the old-Soviet thinking and current Russian and Ukrainian thinking concentrated on the suppression by all means of the enemy’s defense lines. If we speak about modern or future warfare (particularly future large-scale conventional wars between industrial powers), we can expect a similar idea of concentrating “suppression technologies.” However, this time the forces from all domains would be integrated into one or several synergetic formations capable of operating on a much greater scale, as we are witnessing in Ukraine now. Yes, Russia and Ukraine are capable of command and control over more than a thousand kilometers of the frontline, but they are limited in conducting massive, large-scale operations in the context of a continuous front. But it might be the end of the positional stalemate in this war.
Ukraine’s Efforts to Escape the Donbas-Centric War: From Crimea, Belgorod to Kursk
The Russian military-industrial complex has still not reached its full production capacity, and as a result, Moscow faces many issues in producing new types of weapons, especially counter-battery systems. There is no sign that Russia will conduct a massive World War II-type operation, but it is only a matter of time and depends on two factors. The first is the creation of front-type formations (the Soviet military formation which includes several armies) for combat operations in the Donbas and other areas. Under the Soviet Army, front armies consisted of several field armies. In US Army terms, front armies roughly equated to army groups. These front army formations can be considered battering ram formations. The second factor is the success or failure of Russia’s military-industrial complex. Reports from the front and within Russia indicate that the Russian state is only halfway along the path to exhaustion. Successes in the southern portion of the Donbas, coupled with reports of the military-industrial complex increasing production by hundreds of percent (for example, a 215% increase in tank production), are significant.
NATO artillery, signal, electronic warfare, and intel systems, which Ukraine possesses, are still causing enormous problems for the Russian military. However, it appears that Russia has found a solution by creating zones with highly concentrated electronic warfare systems, artillery, counter-battery systems, space, and drone reconnaissance. By this they are creating a type of A2/AD area. Russia has set its own rules of war in the Donbas by inviting the Ukrainians into kill zones within relatively small areas. The first signs of this strategy can be traced back to Bakhmut, where Yevgeni Prigozhin launched an information campaign to convince the AFU and the political leadership to fight for Bakhmut to exhaust AFU’s offensive potential and win the time to build the Surovikin Line. Prigozhin never hid this fact.
In hindsight, it seems the Russians have managed to create one large kill zone throughout the Donbas. As a result, Russia is vehemently resisting moving beyond the region. Any Russian advance could be interpreted as a move toward the concentration of enemy forces, using their artillery and air superiority to their advantage. Russia’s goal is to maximize its dominance in these areas by creating kill zones as mentioned previously. The conceptual issue for the defending side is that to counter such force amassing, they must formulate a sort of cybernetic and synergetic system. Unfortunately for the Ukrainians, they do not possess enough material to create such a structure, recently it was suggested that the AFU had to create from the Kursk region the Russian analog of the kill zone, but it was regretted that it is too late.
It seems that Ukraine is desperately trying to escape the Donbas-centric war, which has become a deathtrap. In the Donbas, Ukraine has limited chances to alter the course of the war, as the Donbas remains one of the most urbanized areas of Ukraine. Liberating these areas with the current number of soldiers and weaponry is simply impossible. The decision to move toward Crimea was correct, as it was an attempt to escape the Donbas pocket, but the counteroffensive failed as well and resulted in positional warfare.
The decision of Ukrainian commanders to send troops to neighboring regions of Russia (before the Kursk operation) in cooperation with the AFU and RDK should be seen again as a way to escape the Donbas-centric war and the Kursk operation is culmination of AFUs search of the exit from positional stalemate and the Donbas kill zone. Theoretically, these moves aimed to force Russia into unpredictable actions, but it seems that Ukraine should be seriously concerned about the North Koreans in the Kursk region and creation of the third battering ram (see below) which aim would be creation of the strategic depth or buffer zone in the Northern Ukrainian regions. Unfortunately, we are already witnessing this process, as Ukraine’s decision to attack the Kursk region has led to the creation of new army formations in Bryansk, Kursk, and Belgorod, along with the introduction of a new regional territorial defense network.
Russia’s fixation on the Donbas pays off for the Kremlin while Ukrainian commands search for a way to find new solutions to the Russian battering ram strategy. The operation in Kursk had a short-lived psychological effect, but not a military impact. The recent decision of Ukraine to present the Peace Plan to the Western allies demonstrates that Ukraine is searching for an existential path that would allow it to survive and win over the Russian aggressors. Recently Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the head of the Office of the President, brought some important details of this plan. According to Podolyak, Ukraine is searching for a way to wage total war against Russia on its territory to force the Russians to pay the highest price for occupation of Ukrainian territories by the attacking their deep rears, logistics, stockpiles and creation of chaos in its command and control system. It again demonstrates that Ukraine understands that in Donbas they don’t have a chance to reverse the correlation of forces in their favor and they logically search for ways to run aways from the Donbas trap.
The Battering Ram Strategy: A Preliminary Analysis
The current success of the Russians in the Pokrovsk direction can be seen as the first practical example of a deep operation since the Second World War. While the speed of this operation is not comparable to that of the Great Patriotic War, it appears that the Russians are returning to their lost tradition of acting from defensive positions supported by strong economic reserves. The Russian General Staff has created several fists or battering rams in the Donbas, which, through a combination of frontal and flanking attacks, aim to create large encirclements of AFU in the region. To achieve this, they have developed two army groups or battering rams that, using the same combination of frontal and flanking maneuvers, are breaching the decades-old Ukrainian fortifications in Donbas.
The first and primary battering ram was created less than a year ago near Avdiivka, with the goal of splitting the Donbas theater into two independent parts by reaching Pokrovsk or, at the very least, cutting several key communication arteries of the AFU in the Donbas. The Russians are now less than 10 kilometers from Pokrovsk, with a particular focus on the T0504 highway, which unifies the Donbas into a single theater of operations. It seems that, for the Russians, broadening the depth of their control in southern Ukraine is more important than anything else. The storming of Pokrovsk will likely occur after the end of the battle for Kurakhove, which is already on the way. The ram has smashed the Ukrainian defense structures in Wuhledar, Selidove within weeks. The Russian experts report that between 20th to 30th October occupied an unprecedented quantity of the Ukrainian lands – 200 square km. Such dangerous situation allowed to some Ukrainian generals to speak about the fact of the collapse of the Ukrainian front in Donbas due to: the lack of the munition and weapons; the catastrophic lack of the manpower and absence of the new flows; the disorganization of the system of the command and control.
From a grand strategy perspective, Russia is seeking ways to fragment the Ukrainian Donbas front by breaking it from a unified front into smaller, chaotic pieces with minimal coordination. This primary task has been assigned to the so-called “Avdiivka ram,” which, since March 2024, has developed into a wedge approximately 30 kilometers wide and over 30 kilometers deep into Ukrainian territory. So far, it is not too dangerous, but if it manages to absorb all neighboring supplementary areas into one front-type formation, it could pose an operational threat to the entire left-bank Ukraine. Especially after taking Vuhledar, Selidove, Kurakhove and finally Pokrovsk this scenario becomes much more likely.
In such a situation we would be witnessing unification of all Russian forces that stretched from Velyka Novosilka to the Banivka village on the north into one front that would be able withstand any possible counteroffensive operation. In order to stop this industrial and military role the resisting side must create a similar Newtonian-type counterforce, which is equal in its industrial power to attacking ram. If Russia would reach this stage of synergy in these rams then it might be an unmountable challenge to Ukraine in upcoming months to stop its westward move.
In addition to the major battering ram near Avdiivka, Russia has activated several supplementary forces that, while less important at the strategic level, are crucial at the operational level. These concentrations of Russian forces near Toretsk, New York, Kurakhove, Staromlynivka, and other locations aim to create the threat of encirclement for the AFU and force them to retreat. In a perfect scenario, the Kremlin would like to achieve full encirclement, but so far, the Ukrainian command has been wise enough to prevent such a disastrous outcome.
However, the weakness of Russia’s strategy in the Donbas lies in its inability to form two parallel, equally strong armies capable of executing a pincer movement in a specific theater. So far, the Avdiivka battering ram remains the only cohesive and powerful force that Moscow has managed to create. There is, however, a strong possibility that if Russian advances continue, these supplementary groups of forces could merge into the “Avdiivka ram.” This would resemble a Soviet-era army more than the Russian forces that fought in Georgia or Syria.
The second area where the Russians have concentrated significant forces is near Bakhmut, with the main objective of breaking the Ukrainian defense lines along the Siverskyi Donets-Donbas Canal and advancing into Chasiv Yar and Kostyantynivka. Success in this direction would mark a critical phase in the Donbas war, as controlling Kostyantynivka would bring the Russians to the final system of fortified cities, including Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. While the forces in this area are not as strong as those concentrated in the Avdiivka battering ram, Russian forces around Bakhmut are supported by several supplementary groups. Ideally, these units would advance toward the Kostyantynivka-Druzhkivka line as a unified army.
There is potential for creating two additional battering rams similar to the forces around Avdiivka and Bakhmut. The Russian forces in the Zaporizhzhia (Robotyne) and Kharkiv (Svatove-Kreminna) regions are particularly suited for such a strategy. That said, these forces have yet to demonstrate the effectiveness seen in the Bakhmut and Avdiivka areas, where the Russians have adopted a more flexible approach, avoiding direct frontal assaults and minimizing involvement in urban warfare.
Graphic: Legend: Red – two battering rams; Green – the supplementary groups of forces assisting the Russians in their offensive operation; Blue – the possible zone where all rams are expected to merge into one large front-type army under a single commander
The most dangerous scenario would be the creation of a single cohesive battering rams or unified fronts (comprising two or three armies). This brings us back to the old tradition of the Second World War, when the Soviet Union organized a sophisticated system of so-called “fronts.” In the Soviet tradition, the term had a secondary meaning: it referred to the highest operational-strategic military formation intended to solve operational-strategic tasks in one strategic or several operational directions within a continental theater of military operations. Usually, a front consisted of several armies and numbered from several hundred thousand to one million soldiers. A front possessed a certain level of autonomy, integrating all branches of the armed forces, including ground, air, engineering, signal, and logistical units. A front could occupy a zone that varies in width and depth depending on the situation and objectives at hand. The width could range from several hundred kilometers, while the depth could extend from several dozen to up to 200 kilometers.
There is great danger that Russian operational art could evolve to a new strategic level, enabling the formation of a front-type structure capable of operating on a greater scale than before. This would involve the full deployment of reserves, efficient military and supply logistics etc. Such a formation would include comprehensive artillery and counter-battery warfare, air power superiority, electronic warfare, and jamming and spoofing capabilities, UAVs (in the near future the drone swarms), the space capabilities (geospatial and signal intelligence), the air defense systems and so on. Essentially, all these elements would function as a single, cohesive mechanism or as an integral cybernetic system. Especially if we assume that in the near future AI and neural networks are going to play a greater role in the modern warfare.
This would be a conceptual blend of the Soviet military concept of a front army, the Western concept of an anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) system, and the integration of all modern warfare tools (electronic, space, UAVs, etc.). In essence, Russia is creating a new form of warfare—this military behemoth could become a dangerous and effective tool in this and future wars, both as a theoretical and practical concept. While A2/AD is typically a static model, this front-type A2/AD would be mobile, incorporating all the aforementioned capabilities. The purpose of this battering ram, functioning as a sort of “roller,” would be to compress and break through defense systems meant to slow or stop the enemy. This could be Russia’s contribution to 21st century military theory by practically developing a conceptual innovation in military doctrine.
As mentioned earlier, Russia has built a large kill zone in the Donbas, but this battering ram is an evolved form of the kill zone, capable of shifting positions along the front line. It is the Russian answer to the positional stalemate which they faced till the mid of the spring 2024.
In other words, we could witness the evolution of the Russian military machine in this war—from initial disorganization and degradation to the development of a new military doctrine. This new approach would combine old Soviet traditions of deep operations and deep battle with modern elements such as large-scale operations led by experienced commanders, along with the incorporation of UAVs, AI, robotic systems, and space-based assets. However, these observations remain preliminary and uncertain, as the evidence of this evolution is still faint on the horizon.
Finally, it should be noted that in Ukraine, there are increasing instances of the Russians enjoying a degree of mobility within a positional front line. They have significantly reduced the number of troops involved in storm operations, instead employing the so-called “tactic of small groups.” They send one or two soldiers which is called “shturmoviks” with artillery, electronic, and drone support. Once identified, these positions are destroyed with artillery and heavy bombs. These operations are often suicidal, but this is exactly how Russia is achieving success in the Donbas. This approach could be called the “tactic of cracks,” as the Russians are probing for weaknesses (“cracks”) in the dense Ukrainian defense lines while revealing Ukrainian positions. This theme requires deeper research, because it has particular importance for future wars. The shtumoviks are sort of new phenomenon in the 21st century because from one side it requires primitive heroism (sole or small group mission), but from other hand it acts under new technologic circumstances which became integral part of their job both for the Ukrainians and the Russians.
Conclusion
Thus, we can say that Russian military strategy and tactics are gradually evolving after the setbacks of the first two years, progressing from the operational-tactical level to the operational level, and potentially toward a more cohesive operational-strategic level. This development presents a dangerous scenario for the future, as it suggests that the Russians are learning how to more effectively command and conduct warfare.
The AFU attempted to shift the course of the war by launching a risky offensive in Kursk. Unfortunately, this operation has not significantly altered the overall situation on the battlefield. Ukraine now finds itself on the defensive in both the Donbas and Kursk. However, a noticeable change for Russia in recent months is their increasing use of flanking maneuvers, pincer strategy at both the tactical and operational levels, allowing them to avoid costly frontal assaults. These changes are particularly evident in the Donbas, where Russia enjoys the superiority, but Ukraine hasn’t given up its attempts to find nonlinear solutions to force the Russians to abandon their plans to occupy its territories. Zelensky’s “Victory Plan” seems to pursue this goal.
A greater potential geostrategic problem arises from Russia’s battering ram strategy. If successful in the Donbas, these battering rams—currently functioning at the tactical-operational level in areas like Chasiv Yar and Avdiivka—could merge into larger, unified front-type groups under a single commander. This consolidation could pose a significant threat to NATO, as it would indicate that Russia has restored its operational art to the level of the Soviet era, with the capability to conduct operations on a much larger scale than those in the Donbas or Kursk.
Additionally, there is a strong possibility that we are witnessing the formation of a third major battering ram in Kursk, which could, in the near future, pose a serious threat to all of Northern Ukraine. Therefore, it is time to consider the creation of comprehensive and deep defense systems along the Dnieper River, as well as providing more substantial military assistance to Ukraine than was seen in 2023 and 2024. It should be noted that the success in creation by aggressor of these rams and their westward moves on the territory of Ukraine would have not only detrimental military-strategy effects, but geopolitical for entire Eurasia.
The key question is how long the occupants can sustain this battering ram strategy, and would the AFU find the forces to stabilize the situation in Kursk region and return the positional shape in the Donbas?
