Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has faced fierce criticism from service members, lawmakers and military analysts over the rapid advance of Russian troops in eastern Ukraine since Kiev launched a bold incursion into Russia’s Kursk region.
Many Ukrainians celebrated their troops’ invasion of Kursk on August 6, hoping that the gamble would force Moscow to redirect resources to new fronts and tip the tide of the war in Ukraine’s favor.
But a breakthrough on the front line in the strategically important Donetsk region this week has sparked a backlash against Kiev’s leadership, with critics arguing that the redeployment of thousands of battle-hardened Ukrainian troops to Operation Kursk has weakened Ukraine’s position.
Russian forces have been closing in on the strategic city of Pokrovsk this week, capturing several nearby towns and forcing undermanned Ukrainian forces to withdraw from prepared defensive positions.
Pokrovsk is one of two major rail and road hubs in the Donetsk region, and losing it would threaten the Ukrainian military’s logistics throughout the region, according to Ukrainian analytical group Fronteligience Insight.
Satellite imagery analyzed by open source researchers at the Finland-based Blackbird Group showed Russian troops were now just five miles (8 kilometers) from Pokrovsk, prompting local authorities to order residents in the area to evacuate.
Oleksandr Kovalenko, a military analyst at the Kyiv-based Information Resistance Group, called the situation on the eastern edge of Pokrovsk a “total defense failure.”
“This is not the fault of ordinary soldiers in service,” he wrote on Telegram. “The problem lies with the people who make the decisions for these soldiers,” he added, referring to Ukraine’s leadership.
Several soldiers from the region expressed concern about the defenses around Pokrovsk.
Zhenya, a soldier with the Ukrainian Army’s 93rd Mechanized Brigade, who took part in the brutal 10-month Battle of Bakhmut last year, described the situation in Pokrovsk as rapidly deteriorating. In his candid assessment of the battle, he criticized the military’s chain of command, citing organizational deficiencies and inadequate responses to changing battlefield conditions.
“I honestly have never seen anything like this. Everything is falling apart so quickly,” he warned. “Pokrovsk will fall apart much faster than Bakhmut.”
Ukrainian troops this week withdrew from Novofrozivka, five miles (8 kilometers) southeast of Pokrovsk. The Kyiv-based security think tank, the Center for Defense Strategies (CDS), said the withdrawal showed a lack of defense resources, despite Pokrovsk’s importance as a logistical hub.
Mariana Bezura, a member of parliament and a member of the parliament’s defence committee, posted photos on Facebook from a visit to the front line near Novofrozivka last week which she claimed showed that the road to Pokrovsk was wide open.
“The trenches in front of Novofrozivka were empty. There were hardly any Ukrainian troops in this city that once had a population of 20,000,” she wrote scathingly. post.
Ukrainian Armed Forces Supreme Commander-in-Chief Gen. Oleksandr Shirsky said in a statement on Thursday that he was visiting the Pokrovsk region and that work was underway to “strengthen the defense of our troops in the most difficult areas of the front and provide the brigades with a sufficient amount of ammunition and other material and technical means.”
Speaking at a press conference in Kiev on Tuesday, President Zelensky described the situation on the front near Pokrovsk as “extremely difficult” but insisted that Russian military advances in the area had slowed in the wake of Ukraine’s Kursk Offensive.
Indeed, Russian forces have advanced more rapidly in Donetsk since August 6 than in the months prior, according to multiple military analysts, including Deep State, a Ukrainian group with close ties to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry and which monitors developments on the front line.
“It’s total chaos,” said deep state figure Roman Pohoryli, pointing to the fall of key towns such as Novofrozivka and the looming threat to Pokrovsk.
Over the past three weeks, Moscow’s forces have swiftly captured more than 20 towns and villages, including their longtime stronghold of New York, with minimal resistance.
Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, attributed Russia’s victory to a lack of experienced Ukrainian infantry and the diversion of resources to the Kursk Offensive.
“Ukraine has committed reserve forces to Kursk, leaving it with fewer options to fill the gaps elsewhere, and some of its more experienced brigades have been replaced with newer, less experienced units,” Lee said.
The soldiers mobilized this summer under new conscription laws enacted by the Ukrainian government to make up for troop losses in Kiev, sending them into combat with little training or experience.
“The soldiers are frozen… they don’t know what to do in real combat,” said a lieutenant in one of the front-line units near Pokrovsk. “At the first explosion many of them turn around and run.”
Soldiers from artillery units near Pokrovsk also noted a shortage of shells and a significant disparity in firepower with the Russians.
“We’re running out of shells. We don’t have enough,” said an artillery commander, noting that many resources are being directed north to Kursk. Over the past month or so, his unit has received just one shell for every six to eight fired by the Russians.
Meanwhile, the Russian military maintains a significant tactical advantage thanks to superior air and drone capabilities, as well as artillery fire, the CDS think tank said.
Stanislav Aseyev, a Ukrainian journalist and soldier currently deployed on the eastern front, warned that there could be “the destruction not only of Pokrovsk, but of the entire Southern Army Group in the region.”
He cited “a complex set of internal reasons, ranging from the planting of flowers in place of fortifications to a lack of understanding by higher-ups of a problem that was obvious to every soldier in the trenches.”
“What can be done for Pokrovsk?” he asked rhetorically. “Unfortunately, the only option is to evacuate as many people as possible. I think the town will soon disappear.”
Fronteligience said Ukrainian leaders could strengthen the front line by sending in new brigades or redeploying troops from other areas, but the fall of Pokrovsk could pave the way for Russian forces to advance toward Ukraine’s fourth-largest city, Dnipro, and take further control.
Cartographer: Aditi Bhandari
