Thread by @Euan_MacDonald

I rarely make predictions, as the future is uncertain and the end is always near, but declarations that #Ukraine's #offensive has #culminated may be premature.
Ukrainian gains continue to be incremental, but the level of fighting has not significantly changed for months. 🧵

While gains on the ground certainly haven't matched declared goals, the counter-offensive can't really be considered to have culminated until there is a sharp drop-off in the fighting.

That hasn't yet been observed.

Indeed, Ukraine may have actually opened another front on the left (eastern) bank of the Dnipro in Kherson Oblast (see photo in OP). It is not impossible that the long-awaited "breakthrough" might come there.

Meanwhile, Russia presses reserves into battle not only in Avdiyivka, but in Vuhledar, wasting insane amounts of equipment and numbers of soldiers on fruitless "meat assaults." Seemingly launched for "political" purposes, these attacks weaken Russia militarily for no gain.

In the early days of the Ukrainian counter-offensive it quickly became apparent that a rapid breakthrough of Russian defenses was not going to happen.

Not only had promised Western equipment failed to arrive, Ukrainian command structures capable of executing NATO-style combined-armed maneuvering warfare simply did not exist - there was little coordination above the battalion level.

When Ukraine tried a limited rapid breakthrough, it was defeated - and the images of this small attempted attack were endlessly recycled by Russian propaganda to bolster early claims that Ukraine's counter-offensive had failed.

Ukraine reverted to the style of warfare it knew best - company-, even platoon-level attacks on limited targets. Successful gains were measured in meters, rather than kilometers. After pressing in three directions in the south, the number of active fronts fell to one - Robotyne.

The initial yardsticks to measure the success of the counter-offensive were no longer relevant. So it could be said the offensive "failed" in early June - but nevertheless it continued, with new ways to gauge success.

It became a war of attrition, with the Ukrainian military, by all believable accounts, becoming one of the rare militaries to suffer fewer casualties on offense than in defense.

But Russia's well-prepared defenses (they were given months to prepare, while the West dithered over whether to give Ukraine tanks) meant that Ukraine's gains on the ground could only be minimal.

Ukraine also desperately needed long-range ATACMS at the start of its offensive, but these were not to come for months.

Delays by the West in supplying these weapons cost Ukrainian lives, and Ukrainian success on the battlefield.

The attacks with ATACMS, officially used by Ukraine for the first time on Oct. 17, have caused Russia to redeploy its frontline aviation (attack helicopters) further to the rear. The version of the weapon given to Ukraine by the US is also useful in attacking supply depots.

Had a longer-range version been given (and in decent numbers - only around 20 ATACMS have thus far been acknowledged to have been supplied), Ukraine could have already been threatening Russian supply depots and lines across the south and east of the country.

Still, Ukraine has had successes not on dry land, but at sea. Over the summer, it liberated some oil rigs in the Black Sea in daring special ops raids, denying the Russians bases of reconnaissance over the entire western Black Sea Area.

This not only allowed Ukraine to reopen its "grain corridor" of agricultural exports (a good FX earner), it also gave Ukrainian special ops troops a platform from which to launch commando raids on the coast of Ukraine's Russian-occupied Crimea.

The raids had a purpose - not only of harassing Russian occupation forces in Ukraine's Crimea, but in destroying Russian air defenses in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory.

With the Russian air defenses destroyed, Ukraine was able to launch missile attacks, first on a landing ship and submarine in Sevastopol on Sept. 12-13, and then on the Black Sea Fleet Headquarters building in Sevastopol on Sept. 22.

These attacks have effectively caused the Russian Black Sea Fleet (BSF) to redeploy to Novorossiysk in Russian proper.

Ukraine, a country famously without a navy, has defeated a fleet of a supposed superpower, and forced it to retreat. That's a counter-offensive success.

Back to predications: Ukraine's offensive will not "culminate" in the way military analysts commonly understand. It will settle into low-level fighting again, with Ukraine continuing to press on several fronts, attriting Russian forces, and looking for chances of a breakthrough.

This will result in more Ukrainian combat casualties, attriting the country's ability to resist Russian invasion.

If Ukraine is to defeat Russia, it must defeat Russia /quickly/.

A long war favors the Kremlin.

The chances of a breakthrough will be boosted if the West provides Ukraine with more military capabilities, and quickly.

The deadlock on the ground can be broken with assets in the air - ATACMS and German Taurus cruise missiles, military experts assert.

Meanwhile, while Western politicians dither, Ukrainian soldiers die.