This is why giving away Donbass cannot be an option for Ukraine 🇺🇦
Donald Trump 🇺🇸 will ask Zelensky to give away Donbass in exchange for a ceasefire with Russia 🇷🇺.
It would mean giving 9 cities and the main fortifications to Russia without a fight.
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Giving away Donbass may seem to be the solution to calm Putin and reach a ceasefire, or even the peace between Ukraine and Russia.
However this cannot be accepted by any government of Ukraine for few simple reasons.
Here, we are mainly talking about the non-occupied part of Donetsk oblast, since the northern part of Luhansk oblast is mainly rural and has been occupied without big fights in spring 2022.
This is what Russia took in 30 month (after the last ukrainian counter-offensive).
As @M0nstas states, this is 5100 km² in 30 months, it means there is still 6500km2 to be taken.
Also in the 5100km2, we count those cities :
-Bakhmut (biggest russian gain in 3 years) 80k pop
-Avdiivka 35k pop
-Torestk 35k pop
-Selydove 24k pop
-Kourakhove 20k pop
- - than 15k
So in 3 years of fight, with the main battles being waged in Donetsk oblast, Russia only took one "big" city (80k inhabitants) and smaller towns, all located in the periphery of Donetsk.
They still have to fight for the big cities of ukrainian controled Donbass.
In the 6500km2 to be taken we count :
-Kramatorsk 160k pop
-Sloviansk 120k pop
-Kostiantynivka 75k pop
-Pokrovsk 65k pop
-Droujkivka 60k pop
-Myrnohrad 50k pop
-Dobropilla 30k pop
-Lyman 22k pop
-Siversk 12k pop
In the lone Sloviansk-Kostiantynivka valley, 415k pop...
Who would be crazy enough to give away without a fight a total worth of more than 600k pop cities, while Russia only took ~250k pop cities in 3 years of war ?
This, without forgetting the area has industrial and mining potential, even if partly destroyed by 11 years of war.
With that stated, there is also the price for Russia. Russia is pushing constanlty in the region. Mainly with infantry, since Ukraine built large anti-vehicle oblastacles and is massively using drones.
This has an enormous human price for Russia.
That is the reason why Putin is not willing to fight for Pokrovsk, for Kramatorsk or Sloviansk.
He would lose too much men, the operation will take far more time and his economy will continue to suffer.
He is seeking an easy victory with D. Trump.
Also, Ukraine built massive fortifications in Donetsk oblast. This region is easily defendable. There are massive cities, industrial complexes, mines and undergrounds.
Everytime there is a field or a treeline, ukrainian fortifications are standing.
In this particular region, a big part of Ukraine's "New Donbass Line" is standing.
It goes from the southern part of the non-occupied part of the oblast to Izium, Kharkiv and now even Sumy !
Here is a map of what would happen with this region in the hands of Russia.
No more big fortifications, an open terrain for further offensive actions in central Ukraine, to push to Dnipro, Poltava, Zaporizhia or Kharkiv oblasts.
If the region is handed over to Putin without a fight, it would place russian forces 10km to Izium, 26km to Lozova and 55km to Pavlohrad.
Those are the only cities west of Donbass, before Dnipro (120km) and Poltava (175km).
Ukrainian soldiers are not willing to give away Donbass, their region, the region they have been fighting for during 11 years, the one where they lost comrades.
Putin will not give anything in return, no Kherson, no Zaporizhia, no Kharkiv. So they have no interest in it.
But if Ukraine is not willing to leave Donbass to Russia without fighting, what will happen ?
Peace will probably not be found, Russia will continue to push and slowly taking the region, or maybe they will be forced to stop.
Russia's economy has been largely left untouched.
If tomorrow, ukrainian drones and missiles are destroying russian economy (factories, mines, oil and gas facilities, ports...), Putin may be forced to stop.
With Trump and the USA disengaging, it is now the role of Europe to continue to support Ukraine, as long as it is willing to fight.
France, Germany, the UK, Poland, Italy, the Baltics and Nordics countries must also become the real rear base of Ukraine.
Thank you for reading this thread.
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I've also updated my biography with a longer version in french, you can translate it easily to know more about me.
After losing the Battle of Mykolaiv, Russian forces retreated behind new defensive lines along the border of Kherson Oblast.
Russian forces arriving from the Kyiv Front took considerably longer than the first Ukrainian brigades sent as reinforcements. These brigades brought reinforcements that pushed the Russians back behind the Inhulets River and established defensive lines in front of Mykolaiv.
Ukrainian 🇺🇦 forces continue to prepare important obstacle lines everywhere on the frontlines.
In the Donbas, we now have multiple "New Donbas Lines", as well as tens barbed wire lines, In Zaporizhzhia, there is now more and more of those barbed wire. Every progress will be costly.
▪️East and South of Kramatorsk, we can count numerous small obstacle lines. West of the city, we can count 3 large lines (the third one is being expanded north), each cut every 10km by a parallel line (I can count around 4 right now), forming small 10/5km rectangles.
▪️In the south, the Novomykolaivka line is now continuous, it is 100km long. East of it, it seems too late to build new lines, but ukrainian forces started to prepare multiple barbed wire lines west of their current defense, the Haichur river.
▪️North of the two defensive lines built in 2024 (the big lines looking south), we can see the first preparations for a third reinforced line that will probably join the Novomykolaivka and the Vilniansk ones, offering a retreat line north of Orikhiv.
▪️In the Pavlohrad direction, a third line in front of Vassylivka is being prepared. The first one is the unfinished line in front of Pokrovsk'e which continues in front of Prossiana, the second is the nearly finished one, which is the longest continuous line Ukraine has (it goes from Ternuvate to Kramatorsk, that's the big one going behind the main cities) and this third line is being prepared south of Vassylivka and west of the second.
▪️Despite the snow, a lot of construction is ongoing everywhere in Ukraine and new lines are getting ready. Every week Russia is waiting means more time and men to get through those lines.
Here those "kill rectangles", the new portion we've been waiting for to connect Veliky Burluk line with Karkhiv one, the multiple barbed wire in front of Prossiana and a map of all Ukraine.
Here a simplified view, with in yellow the main lines and in white secondary lines.
En #Syrie 🇸🇾, les Forces Démocratiques Syriennes (dirigées par les Kurdes) se sont effondrées
Les milices arabes locales et l'armée syrienne sont entrées dans Raqqa et la région, avec une population syrienne en liesse.
Ce soir un cessez-le-feu est annoncé.
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C'est presque un tiers du pays qui échappait encore au contrôle de Damas un an après la chute d'Assad.
Dans le nord-est syrien, les Forces Démocratiques Syriennes, dominées par les Kurdes (YPG/YPJ) contrôlaient un vaste territoire allant jusqu'à l'Euphrate et au delà.
Il faut dire que dans les 4 gouvernorats sous contrôle des FDS, tous sont à majorité arabe, en particulier ceux de Deir-Ez-Zor et Raqqa.
Les Kurdes, concentrés dans le corner du Nord-Est et à Kobané ne formaient qu'une minorité.
The Dnipro campaign, from Kalanchak to Vosenssensk, 2022-2025 🇺🇦/🇷🇺
With this series of 42 historical maps, let's revisit one of the most unique military campaigns of the war in Ukraine 🇺🇦.
PART 1 : Analysis of Ukraine's southern front, february-march 2022
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Feburary 23rd, 2022. More than 20 000 russian 🇷🇺 soldiers amass themselves on the border, facing around 500 ukrainian 🇺🇦 defenders.
Russian 58th, 49th and 22nd army are facing ~1 300 soldiers from the 58th motorized brigade (including 1 000 of whom are at the training ground of Oleshky sands).
This unit is the only one facing the russian invasion south of the Dnipro river. The closest reinforcements are in Mykolaiv (35th Marines), in Zaporizhia, Odessa or Mariupol (they are quite busy). A day before the invasion, 300 soldiers from the 58th motorized are repositioned to Henichesk and Chaplinka, to support the 137th Marine bataillon and border guards (200 soldiers in total).
Why so few men ? Because Ukraine thought Russia would attack in the Donbass, usually, 3 brigades should have been positionned in front of Crimea (the 93rd mechanized brigade was redeployed a week before to Kharkiv, and managed to save the city), only one was there and was not occupying border positions.
On the morning of the 24th, Russia launched massive air and missile strikes on ukrainian positions, radars, airport and air-defense.
The 58th motorized brigade moved from Oleshky sands to meet the russians while the 137th and border guards started fleeing to the bridges.
Russia strikes on to directions, with the 58th army attacking Henichesk and the 49th Kalanchak. Both armies were supported by numerous helicopters and planes.
La question moldave est revenue dans l'actualité, comme très régulièrement depuis 4 ans, avec cette fois une déclaration choc de la président Maia Sandu, qui "voterait pour la réunification avec la Roumanie s'il y avait un référendum".
Si près de 85% de la population du pays se dit moldave ou roumaine (très similaires, histoire commune, les moldaves sont plus nombreux en roumanie), il y a environ 15% de minorités (ukrainiens, russes, gagaouzes, bulgares, allemands, roms...) et la réunification fait 50/50.
Turkiye 🇹🇷, Chad 🇹🇩, UAE 🇦🇪, Kenya 🇰🇪, Saudi Arabia 🇸🇦... who supports who in the Sudan war ?
The Sudan 🇸🇩 war opposing SAF and RSF is no longer a local war for power but rather a regional confrontation between multiple countries.
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Disclaimer : mapping which country supports the RSF and FSR does not mean everything is correct. Russia and Ukraine are not allied, Ethiopia is closed to Turkiye and Saudi Arabia and multiple countries are barely involved or neutral so I kept them in white.
The borders you can see is not the recognized border map but the actual control lines. In black stands djihadist groups, in green SAF allies and in red RSF allies.
Feel free to give me informations on the countries that I mapped as "neutral".
Countries supporting the Sudanese Armed Forces :
The SAF was during a long time without serious allies, but the situation recently changed after they liberated the capital Kharoum.
Here, we'll see the main SAF allies and foreign proxies :