Russia and Ukraine Stay Locked in 2,000-Square-Mile Donbas Stalemate as Hardliners Block Compromise
Updated
Updated · New Left Review · Aug 7
Russia and Ukraine Stay Locked in 2,000-Square-Mile Donbas Stalemate as Hardliners Block Compromise
2 articles · Updated · New Left Review · Aug 7
Summary
About 2,000 square miles of Ukrainian-held Donbas now sit at the center of a war both sides appear unwilling to settle, with Moscow demanding the remaining 11% and Kyiv unable politically to cede land it still controls.
Drones, satellite intelligence and entrenched defenses have turned the front into a near-standstill, while hopes of a Russian seizure of Odessa or a Ukrainian retaking of Crimea are portrayed as militarily unrealistic.
Russia has damaged Ukrainian infrastructure and effectively shut Odessa’s port, a pressure campaign strengthened by the end of US air-defense missile supplies to Ukraine after the Iran war.
The human cost remains vast: perhaps 100,000 men on both sides have died over Pokrovsk alone, even as many Ukrainians now define victory less as reconquest than as ending the war without further concessions.
Western and Russian hardliners still resist compromise, raising the odds of either a long, unstable ceasefire or eventual escalation—including a direct Russia-NATO clash triggered by a major strike.