FT: The AFU Has Become A Formidable Force
- 25.05.2025, 13:15
The Russian offensive will not be successful.
Along a more than 1,000-kilometer front line, aggressor country Russia is regrouping its troops ahead of what military personnel and and analysts see as preparations for a major new offensive in the coming months.
The The Financial Times, analyzing the situation on the battlefield after the intensification of diplomatic efforts to settle Russia's war against Ukraine.
As the publication notes, Ukrainian officials and soldiers are under no illusions about the imminent end of the fighting. They say a May 16 meeting in Turkey with a Russian delegation convinced Ukraine's negotiators that peace is still a distant prospect and Moscow shows no signs of reducing attacks or making concessions. That said, the volatile US support for Ukraine has only emboldened Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, writes the FT.
Ukrainian forces on the eastern front are recording Russian infantry launching assaults on motorcycles, buggies and electric scooters. Said Ismagilov - a former mufti of the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Ukraine "UMMA" and a lieutenant in the 57th OMPBr - compares the occupiers to a "swarm of locusts" that act "not in one big wave, but in an endless stream." According to him, the enemy doesn't care about casualties, and "they just keep advancing ... not for kilometers, but for meters."
In recent weeks, fighting has intensified near Pokrovsk and Konstantinovka in the Donetsk region, pressing on the strongholds of Kramatorsk and Slavyansk, approaching the borders of the Dnipropetrovsk region.
But the Ukrainians "remain a formidable force in defense," Vienna-based military analyst Franz-Stephan Gadi told the publication in a commentary. He said we can expect a gradual advance of Russian troops, "but no imminent collapse, no collapse of the front line." Ukraine's defense forces are now much less dependent on America for artillery supplies because Europe has become more active. The analyst emphasized that the Russian Federation has a superiority in artillery fire, but a slight one.