Russian troop frustration mounts over slow gains in Ukraine

Tactical, strategic and technical problems seen in kilometre-a-day progress in Donbas offensive

Troops walk past damaged buildings in a Russian-controlled part of Mariupol in Ukraine. AP

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Russia’s mounting military losses are sapping the will of its soldiers to fight as an array of technical and strategic mishaps slow progress in Ukraine to capturing as little as one kilometre of territory a day, western officials have said.

Nine weeks into the invasion, Russian President Vladimir Putin has yet to achieve the sort of military or propaganda triumphs that many believe he hopes for before a military parade in Moscow on May 9.

With that deadline approaching, western officials say the effects of Russia’s already questionable tactics and strategy are compounded by political interference and falling morale in the ranks.

Ukraine claims to have taken out 23,000 Russian personnel and although its allies have not confirmed such heavy losses, they say the rate of attrition remains high despite Russia refocusing its offensive on the Donbas region.

Those casualties may yet worsen as Russia has yet to reach urban centres in the Donbas region. Once in built-up areas, Russian units can expect to sustain heavier losses, based on what has occurred in other towns and cities in Ukraine.

“Those losses on Russian forces, we assess to be having a significant impact on the will to fight of wider Russian forces,” said one western official. “We’re still seeing some progress, but we’re seeing relatively slow progress, in some instances perhaps as little as a kilometre a day.”

The Russian failures that have surprised many military analysts and officials include the use of unsecured communications equipment, poor logistics, weapons problems and heavy equipment losses affecting supplies.

The Pentagon has spoken of overstretched Russian forces struggling to maintain a command and control structure, and using unclassified lines that are vulnerable to interception by Ukrainian forces and radio amateurs.

The humiliating loss of the warship Moskva has also damaged Russia’s naval supply options, although both sides say Ukraine has been hit by cruise missiles launched from submarines in the Black Sea.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is believed to want a military success to boast about by early May. AP

Ukraine is thought to have lost thousands of troops, and the UN says about 2,800 civilians have been killed and 3,200 others injured during the two-month conflict.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said it was too early for Ukraine to let its guard down after missiles flew into Kyiv on Thursday while a UN delegation was visiting, but said Russia was being repelled as it tried to seize the east.

Even one of Russia's relative successes — capturing most of the southern port of Mariupol — is not yet complete because of the troops and civilians holed up in the Azovstal steelworks.

With Russia making slow progress, Mr Putin has resorted to menacing hints about his nuclear arsenal as Ukraine's armed forces continue to receive weapons shipments from the West.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said a batch of new weapons recently offered to Ukraine “threaten the security of the continent”, a point taken with irony by western officials who blame Russia for doing exactly that.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi shake hands as they meet in Kyiv. AP

Floodwater edges towards homes in the small Ukrainian town of Demydiv. AFP

Lila stands inside her apartment after a missile strike damaged a residential building in Dobropillia, in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine. Reuters

Residents board-up windows of a damaged apartment building with plywood after Russian shelling in Dobropillya, Donetsk region. AP

A police officer distributes humanitarian aid to people in Lyman, Donetsk. AP

Ukrainian soldiers near Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine. AFP

A Ukrainian soldier receives medical treatment as he and others rest after fighting on the front line for two months near Kramatorsk. AFP

Exhausted Ukrainian soldiers arrive at an abandoned building to rest and for medical treatment after fighting on the front line near Kramatorsk. AFP

Ukrainians attend a solemn religious service to commemorate the fallen in the Russian occupation in Zdvyzhivka, on the outskirts of Kyiv. AP

Hanna Selivon, 77, surveys what remains of her house, which she says was destroyed by Russian shelling on the outskirts of Chernihiv, Ukraine. Reuters

Women cry as they take part in a rally demanding international leaders organise a humanitarian corridor for the evacuation of Mariupol, the besieged Ukrainian city where thousands are trapped. Reuters

Angelina Jolie, Hollywood movie star and UNHCR goodwill ambassador, poses for photo with kids in Lviv, Ukraine. AP

Firefighters try to put out a blaze after an explosion in Kyiv as Russia mounts attacks across Ukraine. AP

A car parked under a tree in the partially abandoned town of Chernobyl. AP

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, right, and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres leave a news conference in Kyiv. AP

Military aid bound for Ukraine at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. President Joe Biden has asked Congress to agree to $33 billion to bolster Ukraine's fight against Russia. AP

Members of the pro-Russia Donetsk People's Republic militia stand guard as civilians go to receive aid in Mariupol. AP

A destroyed building in the south-eastern city of Mariupol. AP

A Ukrainian girl with other civilians on a bus as they flee the violence in Slovyansk, in the Donetsk region. Reuters

A block of flats reduced to rubble in Mariupol. Reuters

Explosions in a village near the eastern city of Izium. Reuters

A car and piled sleepers in flames after shelling near Lyman station in Lyman, eastern Ukraine. AFP

Residents and members of the Ukrainian emergency services clear debris after a recent Russian rocket attack in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine. EPA

The Russian Foreign Ministry in Moscow, where spokeswoman Maria Zakharova recently said that Ukraine had either carried out the executions of civilians in Bucha itself or positioned the bodies so as to incriminate Russian forces. AFP

An aerial view of in a neighbourhood in Zaporizhzhia on the 65th day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. AFP

Clean-up crews at the site of an explosion in Kyiv, Ukraine. Russia struck the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv shortly after a meeting between President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres. AP

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at a joint news conference in Kyiv as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues. Reuters

Russia struck Kyiv shortly after the meeting between President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres. AP Photo

Volodymyr Tykhonov, 76, opens the door of his garage, which is riddled with bullet holes, in Zahaltsi, Ukraine. Getty Images

President Zelenskyy welcomes UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres before their meeting. Reuters

Iulia Shevchuk rests in a reception centre for displaced people in Dnipro, Ukraine. AP Photo

American 155 mm howitzers due to be being loaded on to a US Air Force plane to Ukraine. AFP

Smoke rises after an explosion at sunset in Kyiv. Getty Images

Ukrainian rescuers pull out a part of a rocket that remained after shelling in the eastern city of Kharkiv. EPA

Lyubov, 85, stands in front of a 19th century wooden church, damaged by rocket attack, in the Zhytomyr region of Ukraine. Reuters

Ukrainian servicemen on patrol in Luhanske village. EPA

Russian forces have also been known to misidentify targets and are now largely aiming for fixed targets such as railway infrastructure rather than moving ones such as weapons convoys, western officials said.

Ukraine has said that Russia is taking aim at railway junctions to thwart the transport of military aid from European allies.

Officials said there were examples of Russia using “antiquated mapping” dating as far back as the 1970s, when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, bearing little relation to targets that the invading forces could expect to find today.

Part of the problem, western officials say, is that Russian political leaders planned for a war lasting only days on the basis that Ukrainians would want to be liberated from a regime described by the Kremlin as being run by neo-Nazis.

More recently, the drive for what one European diplomat has described as a “trophy” to show the Russian public by May 9 has hung over the military leadership as it tries to take control of the Donbas.

“What that’s done is it’s compromised the Russian military significantly in terms of their execution of their operations, which has then been compounded by some tactical ineptitude over how they’ve been fighting,” the officials said.

Although Russia has learnt from some of its early mistakes, it has not yet fixed all its problems and there have been some “long, introspective moments”, they said, where “people are asking lots of questions over how this has all gone quite so badly wrong".