Russia’s Swift March Forward in Ukraine’s East

Over the past month, Russian forces have seized more than 160 square miles of land in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, the main theater of the war today. That has allowed them to take control of strategic towns that anchored Ukrainian defenses in the area, beginning with Vuhledar in early October. This past week, battle has raged in Selydove, which now appears lost.

Ultimately, experts say, these gains, among the swiftest of the war, will help the Russian army secure its flanks before launching an assault on the city of Pokrovsk, a key logistics hub for Ukrainian forces in the Donbas.

Russia’s rapid advance is a striking change from the situation last year, when the front lines remained mostly static, with both sides launching ambitious offensives that largely failed.

But the stalemate that defined 2023 laid the groundwork for Russia’s recent progress. However marginal the gains, Russia’s attacks gradually weakened the Ukrainian army to the point where its troops are so stretched that they can no longer hold some of their positions, Ukrainian soldiers and military analysts say.

Half of Russia’s territorial gains in Ukraine so far this year were made in the past three months alone, according to Pasi Paroinen, a military expert with the Finland-based Black Bird Group. “The situation in southeastern Donbas rapidly deteriorates,” he said.