West: Russia has ultimately lost initiative in the battle of Donbas

The West believes that Russia has lost the initiative in the battle of the Donbas, and it will not be able to capture the region in the near future.

This is despite the statements of the Kremlin and its satellites, European Pravda reports, citing PA Media.

According to an anonymous Western official, despite the loss of initiative in the Donbas, “they [the Russians] are not going to just give up and go home”. He added, however, that the war in Ukraine followed an “ups and downs” scenario, so Russia has opportunities to “adapt and adjust what it can do next”.

In a previous briefing by an anonymous Western spokesman, the media wrote that the pace of Russian advance in Ukraine was uneven, and Russian forces were still making “real progress” in capturing the Donbas.

But now West’s assessment has changed: in his view, the occupation of the entire Donetsk region remains “the minimum political goal of the campaign in the Donbas”, but that Russia will achieve it in the next few months is becoming increasingly unlikely.

The anonymous Western official also commented on the strike by Ukrainian forces on the strategic Antonivskyi Bridge in the Kherson region. According to Western estimates, the crossing is “completely unusable”.

Western intelligence estimates that the losses suffered by Russia with each offensive are enormous, and there are very serious questions about Russian weapons stocks and morale. There are doubts that the Russian Federation will reach the borders of the Donetsk region in 2022.

As reported before, the British military estimates that Russia has lost more than 30 percent of its land offensive capability, giving “absolute confidence” to the Ukrainian armed forces that they will win the war. 

According to CNN, Biden administration officials informed them that more than 75,000 Russians have been killed or wounded during the war on Ukraine.

Author - Anastasiya Glotova, 28/07/2022