Ukraine’s top commander says the war has reached a ‘stalemate’

With the front line in Ukraine having barely moved despite months of heavy fighting, Ukraine’s top commander has acknowledged that his forces are in a “stalemate” with Russia and that no significant breakthrough was imminent, the most candid assessment yet by a prominent Ukrainian leader. official of the stalled army counter-offensive.

“Just like in the First World War, we have reached the level of technology that puts us in a stalemate,” the commander, General Valery Zaluzhny, told The Economist in an interview published on Wednesday. “There will most likely not be a deep and beautiful breakthrough.”

It was the first time a top Ukrainian commander said the fighting had reached a stalemate, although General Zaluzhny added that the deadlock could be broken if Ukraine improved its technological capabilities to gain air superiority and improve the effectiveness of artillery fire. enlarge. He added that Russian forces are also unable to advance.

The general said modern technology and precision weapons on both sides are preventing troops from breaking through enemy lines, including the extensive use of drones and the ability to jam drones. He called for advances in electronic warfare as a way to break the impasse.

“We must leverage the power embedded in new technologies,” he said.

The general also said he underestimated Russia’s willingness to sacrifice troops to prevent a breakthrough and prolong the war. “That was my fault,” he said. “Russia has lost at least 150,000 dead. In any other country, such casualties would have stopped the war.” His account of the Russian casualties could not be independently verified.

His comments come at a particularly difficult time for Ukraine in its 20-month battle against invading Russian forces. Western-supplied weapons have not enabled Ukraine to breach Russian defenses, and few weapons remain that can make a difference. Western allies’ willingness to maintain support for Ukraine is waning, including in the United States, where some Republicans in the House of Representatives are reluctant to provide more aid.

While Ukraine managed to drive Russian forces out of almost half of the country they seized during their initial invasion through a series of counter-offensives – surprising many military analysts – the general said that “the war at its current stage gradually transitions to a positional form.” where both parties can pin each other down.

He gave his judgment in a nine-page essay published alongside the interview, noting the need to find “a way out”.

His comments did not immediately draw comment from Ukrainian officials, who have long been wary of labeling the conflict as a stalemate. But Kremlin spokesman Dmitry S. Peskov said Thursday that the war was “not at a stalemate” and that Russian forces would continue to press on on the battlefield.

General Zaluzhny’s comments came amid a broader effort by Ukrainian officials to temper allies’ expectations of quick success on the battlefield, while urging them to maintain military support to allow Ukraine to gain the advantage to achieve on the battlefield. Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Tuesday that the outside world was “accustomed to success” and complained that the performance of Ukrainian troops was “taken as a given.”

In his interview and essay, General Zaluzhny pointed out that the standoff was largely the result of technological parity on the battlefield, with both sides using modern sensors to detect troops and equipment, and advanced weapons to destroy them.

He said he understood the new state of fighting after visiting the front line in Avdiivka, a Ukrainian city in the east that has faced repeated Russian attacks for several weeks. The use of artillery and drones allows each side to wear down the enemy, tie them down and target advancing forces.

“The simple fact is that we see everything the enemy does and they see everything we do,” he wrote.

Geographically localized images analyzed by the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, shows that Russian forces have gained ground on the flanks of Avdiivka but have so far failed to encircle the city. Ukraine’s highest military command said Thursday that nearly 60 clashes had been recorded over the past day around five eastern cities, including Avdiivka, but that Russian forces had failed to achieve their objectives. The account could not be independently verified.

At the same time, Kiev’s southern counteroffensive, launched five months ago amid hopes that Ukrainian forces could split Russian forces in the south, appears to have virtually come to a standstill. Ukrainian forces have failed to break through formidable layers of Russian defensive positions.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies calculated in a recent analysis that Ukrainian forces advanced an average of about 90 meters per day in their southern advance until the end of August.

“It is a tactical blockade,” said Thibault Fouillet, the deputy director of the French Foundation for Strategic Research, noting that Russian and Ukrainian forces mutually cancel each other’s air and ground capabilities. “The front line has had time to freeze.”

General Zaluzhny expressed fears that his troops would become embroiled in a bloody trench warfare similar to World War I, which could last for years and in which Russia, thanks to the sheer mass of its army, could have an advantage.

“Ukraine’s armed forces need significant military capabilities and technologies to escape from this kind of war,” he said in his essay. That includes the massive use of drones and more advanced artillery weapons to breach Russia’s air defense systems, as well as jamming equipment to prevent Russia from flying its own drones.

Ukraine has long lobbied the West to obtain F-16 fighter jets, which are expected to enter the battlefield sometime next year. But General Zaluzhny seemed to indicate that they would be less helpful in this new phase of the war than they might have been previously, as Russia has improved its air defense capabilities.

The essay includes a long list of weapons and military capabilities he said Ukraine would need to break the deadlock, including mine-breaking technology and decoy systems to evade air defenses.

“A positional war is a protracted war that entails enormous risks for the armed forces of Ukraine and its state,” General Zaluzhny said. “If Ukraine wants to escape that trap, we’re going to need all these things.”

Marc Santora And Ivan Nechepurenko reporting contributed.