Russia-Ukraine war: Will there be a spring counteroffensive?

Europes biggest armed conflict since World War II is poised to enter a new phase in the coming weeksWith no suggestion of a negotiated end to the 13 months of fighting between Russia and Ukraine the Ukrainian defense minister said last week that a spring counteroffensive could begin as soon as AprilKyiv faces a key tactical question How can the Ukrainian military dislodge Kremlin forces from land they are occupying Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is working hard to keep his troops and the general public motivated for a long fightHeres a look at how the fighting has evolved and how the spring campaign might unfoldHow did the war get hereRussia launched its fullscale invasion of Ukraine on February 24 2022 but its attacks fell short of some main targets and lost momentum by July Ukrainian counteroffensives took back large areas from August through NovemberThen the fighting got bogged down in attritional warfare during the bitter winter and into the muddy early spring thawNow Kyiv can take advantage of improved weather to seize the battlefield initiative with new batches of Western weapons including scores of tanks and fresh troops trained in the WestBut Russian forces are dug in deep lying in wait behind minefields and along kilometers miles of trenchesHow has Russia fared so farThe war has exposed embarrassing shortcomings in the Kremlins military prowessAlso readMumbai Crime Man who lsquomolestedrsquo woman at Bandra pub nabbed in JaipurThe battlefield setbacks include Russias failure to reach Kyiv in the early days of the invasion its inability to hold some areas and its failure to take the devastated eastern city of Bakhmut despite seven months of fighting Attempts to break the Ukrainian will to fight such as relentlessly striking the countrys power grid have failed tooMoscows intelligence services badly misjudged Ukraines resolve and the Wests responseThe invasion also depleted Russian military resources triggering difficulties with ammunition supplies morale and troop numbersRussian President Vladimir Putin apparently concerned that the war could erode public support for his government has avoided an allout push for victory through a mandatory mass mobilisationThe Russians have no end of problems said James Nixey director of the Russia and Eurasia program at Chatham House a think tank in LondonRealising he cannot win the war any time soon Putin aims to hunker down and drag out the fighting in the hope that Western support for Kyiv eventually frays Nixey saidRussias strategy is designed around getting the West to crumble he saidWhats next for the UkraniansThe Ukrainian military starts the season with an influx of powerful weaponsGermany said this week that it had delivered the 18 Leopard 2 tanks it promised to Ukraine Poland Canada and Norway have also handed over their pledged Leopard tanks British Challenger tanks have arrived tooUkraines defense minister Oleksii Reznikov has said hes hopeful Western partners will supply at least two battalions of the Germanmade Leopard 2s by April He also expects six or seven battalions of Leopard 1 tanks with ammunition from a coalition of countriesAlso pledged are US Abrams tanks and French light tanks along with Ukraine soldiers recently trained in their useThe Western help has been vital in strengthening Ukraines dogged resistance and shaping the course of the war Zelenskyy recognizes that without US help his country has no chance to prevailThe new supplies including howitzers antitank weapons and 1 million rounds of artillery ammunition will add more muscle to the Ukraine military and give it a bigger punchSheer numbers of tanks can drive a deeper wedge into Russian holding positions Nixey saidIn their counteroffensive Ukrainian forces will look to break through the land corridor between Russia and the annexed Crimean peninsula moving from Zaporizhzhia toward Melitopol and the Azov Sea according to Ukrainian military analyst Oleh ZhdanovIf successful the Ukrainians will split the Russian troops into two halves and cut off supply lines to the units that are located further to the west in the direction of Crimea Zhdanov saidWhat might the end game beThe Institute for the Study of War a Washingtonbased think tank reckons that Ukraine will need to launch a series of counteroffensives not just one to get the upper handThe operations would have the twin aims of persuading Putin to accept a negotiated compromise or of creating military realities sufficiently favourable to Ukraine that Kyiv and its Western allies can then effectively freeze the conflict on their own regardless of Putins decisions the institute said in an assessment published this weekNixey has no doubt that each side will keep tearing chunks out of each other over the coming months in the hope of gaining an advantage at the negotiating tableA makeorbreak period may lie ahead If Kyiv fails to make progress on the battlefield with its Westernsupplied weapons allies may become reluctant to send it more of the expensive hardwareThe stakes are high Defeat for Ukraine would have global ramifications and there will be no such thing as European security as we currently understand it Nixey saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever