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  • On September 6, the Ukrainian army launched an attack on the town of Balakliya.

  • It had been held by the Russian army for more than 6 months.

  • But by September 8, the Ukrainian army had recaptured it.

  • And they were just getting started.

  • Over the next few days, Ukrainian forces swept through this Russian-held territory

  • with astounding speed.

  • "Ukrainian forces have blitzed through Russia's gains..."

  • "...in a lightning counter-offensive..."

  • "...forcing Russian forces to retreat..."

  • As of September 14, Ukraine claims it recaptured

  • nearly 8,000 square kilometers of Russian-held territory

  • and liberated dozens of towns.

  • It's a major breakthrough for Ukraine and it marks a new phase in the war.

  • So, how did Ukraine pull off such a stunning attack?

  • And how does it change the war?

  • It's useful to think of the war in Ukraine as having three main phases, so far.

  • The first began when Russia invaded in February 2022.

  • The Russian military swept into Ukraine through the north, east, and south

  • and immediately clashed with the Ukrainian army.

  • This phase was essentially the Russians attempting to force

  • the Ukrainian government to surrender.

  • This is Mason Clark, a Russia analyst

  • at the Institute for the Study of War, an American think tank.

  • Ukrainian forces at the time were in large part outgunned.

  • The most intense fighting took place in a few major cities

  • like Kharkiv, Mariupol, Kherson, and outside the capital, Kyiv.

  • But by April, a few weeks into the war

  • Russia had failed to capture Kyiv or Kharkiv.

  • It did control a large swath of territory, though

  • and continued to fight the Ukrainian army on three main fronts:

  • In the northeast, in the east, and in the south, where it did control Kherson.

  • That's when the second phase began.

  • From about April to August, this map changed very little.

  • Russia, for the most part, stopped conducting large, sweeping attacks

  • and instead relied on its artillery to pound Ukrainian positions.

  • But the Russian army was in bad shape.

  • The US government estimates that as many as 80,000 Russian soldiers

  • have been killed or wounded.

  • It was very, very devastating for them

  • particularly since the losses they were taking early in the war

  • were in the the best of the Russian military.

  • The easy comparison is

  • by this summer, the Russians had lost more men than the Soviets did

  • in nearly a decade of the war in Afghanistan.

  • So, during the summer, Russia used the time to recruit more soldiers.

  • But it didn't go well.

  • A fascinating element of this is that

  • the Kremlin still is calling this a special military operation.

  • It cannot be referred to as a war.

  • That actually matters because the Russians haven't called up conscripts for this invasion.

  • And instead, they're trying to fill these gaps with these various ad hoc methods.

  • The Russians have had to hire more mercenaries.

  • And offer payments to prisoners.

  • They've even raised the age limit to allow men over 40 to join the army.

  • And Russia's sent many of these men, with little training, to the front lines.

  • So it's led to a steady drop off in the quality of Russian personnel throughout the war.

  • But while Russia struggled to rebuild its army, Ukraine had the opposite problem.

  • There was actually a sort of bottleneck in May

  • where they had too many recruits and not enough instructors to train them

  • which is a very good problem to have.

  • With help from its western allies

  • Ukraine was able to quickly train lots of these men

  • before sending them to the front.

  • That has really helped the Ukrainian military not just produce more soldiers

  • but very effective soldiers, better than the Russians.

  • By the end of August they were ready for the next phase of the war.

  • Their own attack.

  • Throughout the summer, Ukrainian leaders talked a lot

  • about their plans to launch an attack.

  • And they made it pretty clear that they would strike here, Kherson, key to control the south.

  • Ukraine moved many of its troops into position near the city.

  • And used their most-advanced artillery to hit the Russians for weeks.

  • They were forcing the under-manned Russian army to make a choice:

  • they had to pick somewhere to send forces and they picked Kherson.

  • When the Russians moved troops to Kherson, they left the northeast vulnerable

  • since it was mostly guarded by those experienced soldiers.

  • So when Ukraine did start their attack in early September

  • they didn't hit much resistance there.

  • Almost as soon as Ukraine's soldiers began the attack, the Russian forces began to flee.

  • These are piles of weapons and ammunition, left behind by Russian troops near Kharkiv.

  • They also left trucks, tanks, and artillery behind.

  • And this is a Russian tank crew frantically fleeing

  • before crashing into a tree.

  • The Russians were running away and withdrawing

  • faster than the Ukrainians were keeping up with them.

  • While the Russians retreated

  • Ukraine took over all this territory

  • which included some important towns.

  • Izyum was a Russian supply dump.

  • And Kupiansk was a crucial railway hub, useful for moving troops and supplies.

  • They've also freed thousands of Ukrainian civilians

  • that have been trapped under Russian occupation for months.

  • I think this was a very well done, opportunistic attack

  • that went just incredibly well for the Ukrainian military.

  • Meanwhile, Ukraine is still attacking Kherson and making some progress.

  • But the attack in Kharkiv has begun a third phase in the war

  • where Ukraine, this time, has the momentum.

  • There's a long road ahead.

  • The Russians are going to try and replace these further catastrophic losses

  • with likely diminishing returns.

  • But I am confident in saying that the shoe is more on the other foot now

  • with Ukrainian forces having the initiative of choosing where

  • the next major battle of the war will occur.

  • And they have clearly demonstrated

  • that they can and fully intend to take this war into 2023

  • and drive out the occupying Russian forces.

On September 6, the Ukrainian army launched an attack on the town of Balakliya.

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