Withdrawal total number of injured e - at the moment partial - of the military and paramilitary fighters barricaded inside the Azovstal bunker-fortress is the news of the day, but - as often happens - reading the comments and the news helps us to understand only part of the situation in Ukraine at the moment.
In the last few days some things have happened silently and have not been written down and others - which have happened noisily - have not been understood or analyzed in depth: in the end, we still continue to believe that a Russian "great offensive" is underway, but is not so.
To help us understand better, as usual, we will use some maps.
This is a photo of the locations on the ground Sunday April 24. As you can see, the territories occupied by the Russians, those disputed and those under the government of Kiev are indicated. Let's talk, to understand each other, about the situation one month after the "great retreat" (yes, massive) of the Russian troops from Kiev, Chernihiv and Sumy.
This is a photo of the locations today Monday May 16, namely yesterday. Take a good look at it:
What has changed? Well, we can point to at least four macroscopic differences:
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The area around Kharkiv has been liberated, the Ukrainians have regained control of the territory up to the border with the Russian Federation and have gone a long way east towards the city of Izyum, the seat of the Russian command for many weeks; to be clear, the one annihilated by a surprise attack that almost liquidated the same joint chief of staff Valery Gerasimov.
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The area west and north of Kherson was taken over by the Ukrainians, while the Russians stayed away from Mykolayiv and Kryvyi Rih. We have not been able to recover images, but our sources confirm the annihilation of a large Russian contingent while it was crossing the river. Another massacre, after that of Siversky Donetsk ... (see article) -
The area around Izyum has seen an advance of the forces of Kiev that lead to think that in the next few weeks the same town could be liberated.
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Between Zaporizia and the southern Donbass area, the forces of Moscow have made advances ... backwards, in the sense that they have been hired by the Ukrainians and forced to retreat.
The area around Severodonets remains, the last very modest military target left for the Russians, less than twelve weeks after the start of the so-called "special military operation", before the twenty billion dollars of military aid promised by the Americans reaches the territory and Ukrainian troops.
Warning: this is not a propaganda or optimistic speech, but a fact. Suffice it to say that not even the strict censorship imposed by Putin manages to hide this which is a real concern for Russia: Monday May 16 on the main Russian state TV channel, Rossiya 1, former Colonel Mikhail Khodarenok, expressed very critical positions on the progress of the war in Ukraine on a well-known TV talk show: he said, in fact, outspoken that the war is going badly for Russia, that the willpower of the Ukrainians offers an incomparably greater advantage than the Russian "numerical superiority" alone and that it will get worse and worse because the new weapons will soon arrive , modern and effective, promised by the United States.
Then, the Slavic giant will find itself in "total geopolitical isolation", being able only to count on the possible support of China and India which will certainly not be free ...
