Ukraine's army is making slow and bloody progress in its push to retake territory occupied by Russia. Minefields, weapons, morale, politics, and the weather will all play a part in the conflict in the months to come.
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00:00 Ukraine is paying a heavy price for every metre of its land recaptured from Russian
00:07 control. The counter-offensive, which began in June 2023, has so far failed to deliver
00:12 Putin's forces a knockout blow.
00:14 There was a lot of hope for the counter-offensive. I think by all accounts it's fair to say
00:18 that it hasn't gone entirely to plan.
00:22 Can new weapons tip the balance in Ukraine's favour in the months to come, or will Putin's
00:27 war of attrition grind on indefinitely?
00:31 The long wait for Ukraine's counter-offensive in the south and east gave Russia time to
00:36 dig in, and hopes that modern tanks would bring about a swift advance never materialised.
00:43 My name is Mia Yankovic and I'm a senior news reporter. Russia's defences there are really,
00:48 really strong. Ukrainians seem to have switched to an infantry-led tactic, where they're attempting
00:54 basically to try and almost go through on foot, supported by artillery fire. Ukraine
00:59 is now potentially the most mined country on earth, and they're trying to get through
01:05 all of this while under the constant surveillance of reconnaissance drones.
01:11 Yet slowly Ukraine is advancing, using longer-range weapons to target Russian artillery positions
01:17 and logistics hubs, while infantry painstakingly clear minefields and Russian trench lines.
01:24 They are instead having to go almost tree-line to tree-line, road to road, village to village,
01:29 in order to make slow but steady gains.
01:31 There are fears the onset of winter may grind this momentum to a halt.
01:37 Classically, winter tends to slow down warfare. The ground is either impassable because it's
01:42 too wet and it's muddy, or it's frozen over and it's hard to dig trenches, and typically
01:48 things slow down at that point.
01:50 Cutting-edge weaponry has helped Ukraine in recent months, and there's the prospect of
01:54 more on the way.
01:55 There's been quite a lot of different technology passed over to Ukraine from Western allies.
02:01 The Storm Shadow Scalp Missile from the UK and France. This is a cruise missile with
02:06 the capability of striking into the Russian space.
02:10 Another example would be the very controversial gift of cluster munitions. It has the potential
02:16 to leave small bomblets unexploded around the country long after the conflict is over.
02:22 It's very useful for doing exactly what it needs to do right now, which is to be firing
02:26 on artillery, infantry, moving vehicles, exactly the kind of ground fight that it's engaged
02:32 in right now.
02:34 The United States has agreed to supply F-16 fighter jets. NATO countries are training
02:39 Ukrainian pilots to fly them.
02:42 It's not as simple as just giving Ukraine F-16s, unfortunately. But there's a really
02:46 long lead time getting things like F-16s and then being able to use them. And in truth,
02:50 they're probably not relevant to this counter-offensive at this point.
02:54 Both sides are locked in an arms race to produce enough ammunition and drones, as well as train
02:59 enough soldiers to tip the balance in their favour.
03:02 There's no silver bullet for the landscape of this war. As one analyst told me, there
03:07 is no single weapon that can win a war.
03:10 Western allies have promised unwavering support for Ukraine, but a change in American politics
03:15 could jeopardise that.
03:17 We know that Zelensky and Biden have a great relationship, and I don't think the resolve
03:21 is wavering in any sense in the White House right now. If the composition of the House
03:26 changes towards the more right-leaning factors within the Republican Party, you have this
03:32 potential for the US to be sending over much less military support to Ukraine.
03:38 After the failed mutiny by Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the mercenary Wagner Group, the
03:43 prospect of Russian internal politics playing a part in this conflict is still very real.
03:48 What's happened with Wagner in the last few months is really interesting in terms of the
03:53 future of the conflict. The rebellion was a huge embarrassment to Putin, but ultimately
03:58 he has allegedly taken out the major threat in the form of Prigozhin himself, and that
04:04 may actually have cemented his power. No one can know what's in Putin's mind, but what
04:12 he may be hoping for at this point with the kind of slow attritional warfare that we're
04:17 undergoing would be to simply wear down the Ukrainian troops by defending what he already
04:22 has, essentially trying to buy time in order to keep Ukrainian forces just coming at him,
04:29 coming at him, and coming at him until they've spent their abilities to fight.
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