Ukraine claims its first gains in summer counteroffensive

Ukrainian officials have publicly claimed their first major gains in their counter-offensive, announcing the liberation of several villages that were captured by the Ukrainian Armed Forces over a weekend that saw fierce fighting break out all along the frontlines. 

On June 12th, Ukraine’s 35th Marine Brigade posted videos of its raising the Ukrainian flag above the liberated settlement of Storozheve in Donetsk according to NBC News, and the country’s Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar later confirmed the gains. 

“It will be the same with every settlement until we liberate all Ukrainian land,” the Deputy Defense Minister wrote on her Telegram with an image of the soldiers holding the brand new flag in front of a house in the settlement. “Thank you… next will be?” Malair added. 

The gains being made by Ukrainian forces have been loaded online as exceptionally for their opening salvo and NBC News noted they were small-scale gains that would be the first of what would be a very long and hard battle to recapture Ukraine’s south and east.  

“Appropriate counter offensive and defensive actions are taking place in Ukraine. I will not say in detail at what stage they are,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said during a news conference in Kyiv where he acknowledged the counter-offensive for the first time. 

However, news has been trickling out online and it hasn’t been just good. CNN reported that over the first few days of the counter-offensive, Ukraine lost sixteen of its Bradley Fighting Vehicles, which represented 16% of the 109 the United States gave to Kyiv.

Luckily, this wasn’t entirely unexpected. Former British Army officer and defense analyst Nicholas Drummond told CNN that the size of the front in Ukraine compounded with the country’s four main lines of attack led him to expect the losses as costly but necessary. 

“We are not seeing catastrophic damage. This suggests that the vehicles are doing their job and the crews are escaping,” Drummond said, noting he wanted to see the armored vehicles supported by more artillery fire as well as more combat aircraft. 

“You can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs,” the former office added, also pointing out to CNN that most “of those vehicles are just damaged and abandoned, so it might be possible to recover and repair them if Ukraine takes the area.”

Despite the losses, Ukraine is still making progress. Video footage taken before June 12th showed soldiers had taken the villages of Blahodatne and Velyka Novosilka, key settlements along one of the country’s main routes of attack according to The Guardian.

The Guardian noted troops from another brigade shared footage with their unit's banner in the town of Neskuchne and later on June 11th, Hanna Maliar confirmed the village of Makarivka on her Telegram channel, adding that defensive troops had lost no positions.

The scale of what’s already been recaptured is probably a lot more than the Ukrainians are letting on but operational security is once again proving paramount in their attacks, luckily more and more news has been trickling out and things appear to be going well. 

The Institute for the Study of War noted on June 11th that Ukrainian forces were trying to execute an “difficult tactical operation” and said that the country’s soldiers were going up against well-prepared Russian defensive positions without proper air superiority. 

The American non-profit war researchers also wrote that onlookers shouldn’t let Ukraine’s initial assaults influence their opinions on how further operations will unfold since the country’s military leadership hasn’t fully committed the entirety of its reserve forces. 

“The Russian military remains dangerous and Ukrainian forces certainly face a hard fight, but Ukraine has not yet committed the vast majority of its counteroffensive forces and Russian defenses are not uniformly strong along all sectors.” ISW analysts wrote. 

So far things seem to be going well. The first attacks in the counter-offensive have been launched by all accounts and territory is being retaken. How the story will end has yet to be seen but there will most likely be a lot more good news in the coming weeks.