(Reuters) - Ukrainian troops are suffering high losses because Western arms are arriving too slowly to equip the armed forces properly, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told CNN in an interview aired on Sunday.

Russia has been gaining ground in parts of eastern Ukraine including around Pokrovsk. Capture of the transport hub could enable Moscow to open new lines of attack.

Zelenskiy said the situation in the east was “very tough”, adding that half of Ukraine’s brigades there were not equipped.

  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    What benefit does striking some random target hundreds of miles within Russia accomplish for Ukraine, who is slowly losing the ability to hold ground?

    The goal of the Ukraine conflict is to create a Pyrrhic victory for Russia so costly that it collapses from within. Long range missiles capable of destroying key domestic infrastructure and material reserves will (hypothetically) hasten that economic collapse.

    If you can start hitting major financial centers, administrative offices, and social meeting spaces, you might even be able to decapitate some of the senior leadership and kick off a succession crisis in Putin’s government. Alternatively, you push these leaders so far down into hiding that they can no longer effectively govern the country and foreign-sponsored insurgents can take over.

    That’s the theory of the war, at least. In practice, NATO leadership is still unsettled by the prospect of a Total War with a nuclear armed state. So they’re not quite ready to drop a long range cruise missile on the Frunzenskaya Embankment, for fear of what a retaliatory strike would look like.

    • InvertedParallax@lemm.ee
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      2 days ago

      No.

      It’s just because Russian logistics is shit, they know where the depots are because they’re unbelievably huge, and being able to strike them basically brings us back to something like September of 2022 when they were blowing up depots left and right, crippling the advance completely.

      It’s hard to fight an opponent who can stage perfectly behind their own lines and you can only hit them after they cross, when they can hit you whenever.

      • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        Just like any countries that put their economies on war footing, it is creating a bubble that would eventually burst. The Russian economy is booming because of increased government spending. But how long will it last especially with Russia being heavily sanctioned than before, and will continue to do so even if Russia wins? Even as we speak, 98% of Chinese banks refuse to lend to Russia since Chinese banks are more afraid from secondary sanctions by the more lucrative market of the United States.

      • CheeseNoodle@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        Isn’t their current level of inflation now what it was at when they decided it was time to enact emergency measures? measures that are still in place yet haven’t prevented inflation from continuing to rise.