Vladimir Putin took much credit for Russia’s success in taking control of Kupyansk in eastern Ukraine late last year, although Volodymyr Zelensky immediately disputed that claim by making a video address of the town.
Now, Russian forces are being gradually pushed out of Kupyansk by Ukrainian troops, according to two people in Moscow with knowledge of the situation.
It’s an embarrassing twist for President Putin as the warring sides prepare to re-intensify fighting with winter’s snow giving way to spring on the battlefield. The Russian Ministry of Defense did not comment on the situation in the city, which is an important railway hub.
While the setback is more tactical than strategic for Russia, it underscores that Putin is far from achieving his stated goals in the war, now in its fifth year. Russian forces are making some creeping territorial gains and Ukrainian troops are making inroads in other areas, but the front line is largely bogged down and neither army is capable of a decisive breakthrough.
Both sides are trying to “deny their adversary freedom of movement not just 30 kilometers to either side of the line of contact, but up to 300 kilometers,” said James Everard, the former deputy supreme commander of NATO’s allied forces in Europe. “Whoever dominates in depth can strangle the other side by stopping the flow of supplies and reinforcements. This is a fight.”
Hopes for a diplomatic solution to the war are receding as the US-Israeli attack on Iran consumes President Donald Trump’s attention. US-led talks between Ukraine and Russia have stalled, with little indication that talks on a potential peace deal will resume soon.
The Russian military is preparing for a new offensive campaign, people familiar with Kremlin discussions and the situation on the front said. Without a breakthrough in negotiations, the war could drag on for another year or two, one of them said. Backups are likely to be minimal because the military cannot overcome Ukraine’s drone defense wall, another person said.
Ukraine expects a renewed Russian crackdown on the fortified towns of Slovyansk and Kramatorsk in the eastern Donetsk region in April and May, although Moscow likely still lacks the force needed to take them, according to Mykola Bielieskov, a researcher at the Kyiv National Institute for Security Studies.
“Unfortunately, Russia’s inability to breach our defenses means the focus is likely to shift towards destroying Ukraine’s critical infrastructure,” he said.
Calculating the battlefield for each side is brutally simple.
According to the Kremlin, Russia’s military goals for 2026 are to take control of the rest of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas, including the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, and as much other territory as possible to strengthen Moscow’s position in peace talks.
For Ukraine, the strategy is to kill or injure more Russian soldiers than Moscow can recruit as replacements, which gradually weakens its ability to sustain an advance and creates opportunities for counterattacks.
Ukraine has set a target of 50,000 Russian casualties per month, exceeding the Kremlin’s monthly average of 35,000 to 40,000 new recruits, although Kiev has not yet met that target.
President Zelenskyi said on March 17 that Russia was admitting up to 45,000 people a month and that Ukraine had killed or wounded nearly 100,000 Russian soldiers in the past three months.
The US told its allies last week that it still believes it can bring Russia and Ukraine to the negotiating table, although there has been no movement so far and the sides remain far apart. She supported the decision to ease U.S. sanctions against Russia on some oil sales, but said it was temporary, according to a person familiar with the discussions who asked not to be identified because the matter is not public.
Russia has not backed down on its demands, including the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from territory in eastern Donetsk that Moscow’s forces have failed to capture in fighting since 2014. Ukraine refuses the concession, and the US has proposed turning the area into a free economic zone.
On Monday, Zelensky expressed hope that trilateral talks would resume in the coming weeks.
“I don’t believe it’s a dead end,” he told reporters in an audio recording. “What should we do if it’s a dead end? Give up? Relax?”
Rising oil prices due to war in the Middle East give Moscow a budget windfall that facilitates Putin’s ability to finance the invasion. That’s because the government in Kiev has to reckon with the risk of slowing the flow of US weapons, including air defense missiles bought by its European allies, as Washington focuses resources on the conflict with Iran.
Zelensky toured Middle Eastern countries over the weekend, seeking to reap the benefits of sharing Ukraine’s anti-drone experience and technology with Gulf states facing repeated Iranian attacks. He signed 10-year defense deals with Saudi Arabia and Qatar that he said were worth “billions”.
Zelenskyy hopes to trade the supply of Ukraine’s low-cost drone interceptors to the Gulf states for access to the stockpile of vital air defense missiles it needs to protect Kiev and other Ukrainian cities from Russian attacks. He said he had signed a contract for more than a year’s worth of diesel supplies during visits to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, without elaborating.
As Russia continues its relentless airstrikes against Ukraine, including a campaign targeting energy infrastructure throughout the winter, Ukraine is also bringing the war launched by Putin closer to the Russians.
According to the Russian Security Council, there were more than 23,000 Ukrainian airstrikes against Russian infrastructure in 2025, almost four times the 6,200 attacks in 2024.
“The pace of development of means of destruction, especially unmanned systems, and the sophistication of the methods of their use are such that no region of Russia can feel safe now,” Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu said on March 17, according to the Interfax news service.
Ukraine is currently seeking to undermine Russia’s ability to benefit from rising oil prices with drone attacks targeting its oil export infrastructure in the Baltic Sea ports of Primorsk and Ust-Luga.
Russia’s improved economic fortunes will lead to “stronger recruitment and supply than previously expected,” said Nick Reynolds, a land warfare researcher at the Royal United Services Institute in London.
Still, “Ukraine’s military adaptation may allow them to continue to minimize their own losses while inflicting heavy losses on Russian ground forces and holding the line through the summer,” he said.
With the help of Aliaksandr Kudrytskyi, Andrea Palasciana and Volodymyr Verbianyi.
This article was generated from an automated news agency source without text modification.
