Ukraine Counterattack Is Heavy Going, West Says

KYIV, Ukraine—Russian forces are badly depleted but Ukraine’s counteroffensive is off to a slow, grinding start, Western allies said, as stiffer-than-expected Russian resistance, including minefields and defensive fortifications, and a lack of aircover have dashed any hopes of a swift breakthrough.

“It’s going to be very difficult. It’s going to be very long, and it’s going to be very, very bloody,” U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said last week.

The U.K.’s military commander, Admiral Tony Radakin, offered a similar assessment Tuesday, saying the counteroffensive: “Is going to be deliberate, methodical, there is nothing here that is going to be swift.” 

The Western assessments of the counteroffensive, the first to be shared publicly, underscore the challenges facing Kyiv as it seeks to oust the Russian army from some of the nearly 20% of Ukraine still under occupation. Ukrainian battlefield successes are also important in maintaining support in the West, which has sent billions of dollars in military aid.

Russia’s military has been severely depleted by its 16-month invasion and is exhausted after a monthslong offensive of its own that notched only minor successes.

Since 2022 the Russians have lost around 50% of the combat effectiveness of their army, expending 10 million shells and losing over 2,000 tanks, Radakin said.

“Russia is so weak it does not have the strength for a significant counteroffensive,” he said.

But Russian forces have spent months preparing for a Ukrainian counteroffensive that is expected to deploy tens of thousands of soldiers trained and equipped by the West. Ukrainian officials say Russia is aiming to blunt Ukraine’s counteroffensive then seek a cease-fire to rearm and pursue its main goal of controlling its neighbor.

Progress has been grinding since Ukraine launched its counteroffensive in June, as forces butt up against dense Russian defenses.

Ukraine, which still has most of its Western-trained forces in reserve, has advanced several miles in the southeast and seized several villages in pushes toward the Sea of Azov. Senior Ukrainian officials say forces are proceeding with caution in an effort to preserve lives and precious equipment and have complained that support from the West has been insufficient.

Mykhailo Podolyak, a senior Ukrainian presidential adviser, said on Twitter Wednesday that the West had hesitated and wasted time despite having “a golden lottery ticket” with Ukraine ready to degrade the military of the West’s main strategic opponent if provided with the right weapons.

Still, Ukrainian and Western officials say the counteroffensive is in its early stages.

A senior Ukrainian official noted that the Ukrainians are advancing faster than Russian forces did in their winter and spring offensive, which seized little more than the small eastern city of Bakhmut despite heavy losses.

But Ukrainian forces have to proceed cautiously, the official said, because its population is about a quarter of the size of Russia’s because of an exodus driven by the invasion.

Milley said the Ukrainian advances were small, with 500 to 2,000 meters taken a day. “This is going to take six, eight, 10 weeks,” he said at the National Press Club last week. “Sure if it goes a little slow, that is the nature of war.”

The Ukrainians are launching long range missiles to destroy Russian logistic hubs—such as fuel depots and command posts—while making probing attacks along multiple axes to test defensive lines, Radakin said. “I would describe it as a policy of starve, stretch and strike,” he said. 

He noted that Ukrainian forces hadn’t yet reached Russia’s most formidable defensive positions. 

The logistical challenge, meanwhile, is steep: Ukraine’s army has been augmented with donations of tanks and other equipment from around the world. It needs a lot of spares to keep its patchwork army going, which is in itself a huge complication. However, Radakin noted that several Western allies including the U.S. and U.K. have a pipeline of support coming to help Ukraine sustain the war.

Western officials don’t expect the mutiny by Russian paramilitary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin to affect the Russian army’s defense of Ukraine. Many troops from his Wagner Group had already been withdrawn from Ukraine, they say. But Ukrainian officials celebrated the mutiny as a sign of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s fragility, which undermines the Kremlin’s assumption that it holds the upper hand in a war of attrition.

Putin’s inability to control conflicts within his team showed his weakness both to potential domestic challengers and to foreign governments, like India and China, which have retained friendly relations with Moscow, the senior official said.

Write to Max Colchester at [email protected] and James Marson at [email protected]

Corrections & Amplifications
A senior official said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inability to control conflicts within his team showed his weakness to foreign governments like India and China. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said Putin’s weakness was shown to foreign governments like India and Russia. (Corrected on July 5)