Out in the cold? As winter closes in, Ukraine fears being forgotten

In doing so there is a real danger of course that it also drops from our thoughts. Or, to put this another way, already the war in Ukraine, Europe’s largest since 1945, would appear to have undergone a shift in the way many perceive it in certain parts of the world.

That much was underlined by a recent study of the “geopolitics of emotion,” conducted by the European Council on Foreign /Relations (ECFR). The study was compiled just prior to the war in Gaza, and reveals a worrying, if unsurprising, trend.

In short, public opinion in large non-western countries is more interested in when the war will end than in how it will end. Many too it seems in these parts of the world, namely the so called Global-South, also see the West and Ukraine as the major hindrance to peace.

They also believe that in the coming year Russia will carry the day and that the battle between Moscow and Kyiv is simply a proxy for a showdown between Russia and the US.

A single survey like this doesn’t of course convey the whole picture. The fact is that for some time now there have been two camps when it comes to attitudes to the war.

The first is that of Western leaders following Ukraine’s line that the country’s territorial integrity needs to be restored. The second, including a large number of countries in the Global South, prefer to emphasise the importance of dialogue and an early cessation of violence.

But when viewed from Kyiv’s perspective it nevertheless presents a worrying trend. For even if in Ukraine’s eyes the prevailing view from the Global South, matters less than say that from Washington, London, Paris, Berlin, Warsaw and elsewhere among Ukraine’s allies, it should still be reason enough to give Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy even more sleepless nights than the many to which he has become accustomed.

Ukrainian soldiers of the 72nd Mechanized Brigade on duty as Russian attacks on the city of Vuhledar, where a 'tank duel' is taking place between the two armies, continue in Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine 

Western attention

For some time Zelenskyy has been all too aware of how fickle support for Ukraine in the West can be. The Ukrainian leader knows that with a recent refocusing of Western attention toward the Middle East, he will have his work cut out in the coming months.

“Yes. A lot of people, of course, in the world are tired,” Zelenskyy admitted in an interview on NBC's “Meet the Press,” earlier this month, acknowledging the fatigue over the war.

He also admitted that, “of course, Russia is very happy with this war,” recognising that recent events in the Middle East had taken the spotlight off Ukraine.

These concerns come even before factoring in the prospect of a looming US presidential election amid Republican opposition to additional American cash for Kyiv’s war efforts. Evidence of the extent to which the war in Ukraine and its consequences can be instrumentalised in domestic elections were all too apparent recently in both Slovakia and Poland, where support for Ukraine became contentious electoral issues. And while Western support has not yet cracked the signs of a shift are ever present.

To that end United States President Joe Biden has made a point of linking American support for Israel and Ukraine, saying both are vital for national security.

Earlier this month Biden's secretary of transportation, Pete Buttigieg, paid an official visit to Ukraine in an effort to reassure Zelenskyy that the US commitment has not wavered.

“The fact that I am here is one way to demonstrate that, in addition to the great concern and attention that we have toward what is going on in the Middle East, we have as much attention, focus and commitment as we have ever had right here to Ukraine,” assured Buttigieg, standing outside of St. Michael’s Church in Kyiv.

But his remarks have done little to dispel concerns of many Ukrainians who also look on as divisions over Ukraine have emerged in the European Union (EU).

Cumulative EU budgetary support to wartime Ukraine is set to surpass that from the US this year. Europe, including the UK, may need to take on more of the financial and military burden if the US political situation worsens. But still the EU says it cannot provide all the munitions it promised to Kyiv.

Zelensky has confirmed that deliveries of key artillery shells to his country have dropped off after the start of the Israel-Hamas war.

“Our deliveries have decreased…they really slowed down,” Zelensky recently told reporters, referring specifically to 155-millimeter shells that are widely used on the eastern and southern frontlines in Ukraine.

“It’s not like the US said: We don’t give Ukraine any. No! It’s just that everyone is fighting for (stockpiles) themselves,” he says. “This is life. I’m not saying that this is positive, but this is life, and we have to defend what’s ours.”

A view of a destroyed building in Avdiivka, Ukraine

War stalemate?

For the moment despite these logistical and supply setbacks, Ukraine continues to defend its land even if General Valery Zaluzhny, Ukraine’s popular commander-in-chief, himself acknowledged in a recent interview with The Economist that the war is at a stalemate.

“Just like in the first world war we have reached the level of technology that puts us into a stalemate,” he said. The general concluded that it would take a massive technological leap to break the deadlock. “There will most likely be no deep and beautiful breakthrough,” Zaluzhny admitted.

The course of Kyiv’s counter-offensive has undermined Western hopes that Ukraine could use it to demonstrate that the war is unwinnable, forcing Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, to negotiate. But Putin appears hell-bent on pressing home with Russia’s full commitment undercutting what The Economist described as General Zaluzhny’s assumption that he could stop Russia by bleeding its troops.

But some military analysts believe that Zaluzhny’s assessment belies an accurate description of what is actually happening on the ground. Among them is Jack Watling of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) in London.

“It strikes me as a description which is overly focused on terrain. And when you look at the rates of attrition on both sides and what is being lost and consumed, it’s a position that can’t be maintained indefinitely,” Watling said in a recent podcast interview with the Financial Times.

“Stalemate would suggest that if we just left things as they were, it would remain the same. That’s not the case. It will remain the same for a period, and then you see non-linear progression as one side gains advantage or loses it.

According to other military observers, the fighting currently is concentrated along an axis in the south that includes Robotyne and a push towards the city of Tokmak, which one Ukrainian general described as the “minimum goal” for the offensive.

Though once again winter weather that softens up the ground has become a major strategic factor, Ukrainian officials say that because they are conducting small-unit infantry attacks rather than large-armoured thrusts, they can keep attacking even as the weather deteriorates and changes the dynamic on the battlefield.

But as Zelenskyy has previously made clear, supplies of ammunition, especially shells, remains a challenge at precisely the moment when North Korean supplies of munitions begin flowing to Russia in substantial numbers.

Russian President Vladimir Putin 

Russian failure

Another area of heavy fighting is in Avdiivka, near Donetsk city, where Russian forces, their numbers swelled by reserves, are trying -and failing -to take a heavily fortified town that they surround on three sides.

Anton Kotsukon, spokesperson for the 110th separate mechanised brigade, said Russian forces were massed on three sides of Avdiivka.

“They are building up reserves. They've brought in about 40,000 men here along with ammunition of all calibres," Kotsukon told national television. "We see no sign of the Russians abandoning plans to encircle Avdiivka.”

Russian forces, he told Reuters news agency, were “playing cat and mouse”, sending up "huge numbers" of drones while deploying artillery forces to secure a better picture of the town's defences.

General Oleksandr Tarnavskyi, head of Ukraine's southern group of forces, said troops around Avdiivka were “stoutly holding their defences”.

Avdiivka has become a symbol of Ukrainian resistance. It was seized briefly in 2014 when Russian-backed separatists captured chunks of eastern Ukraine, but Ukrainian troops retook it and built up fortifications. Ukrainian forces regard Avdiivka as a gateway for future advances to recapture territory in the east - the large Russian-held town of Donetsk is 13 miles away.

A third area currently seeing some of the heaviest fighting is to the east of Kherson city, where Ukrainian forces in recent weeks have managed to establish and hold a beach-head on the south side of the Dnipro river -a tactical victory that has enabled them to funnel heavy equipment across the waterway. Ukraine’s military confirmed the advances in a statement on Friday without naming where they were.

“The Ukrainian marines, in co-operation with other units of the defence forces, managed to gain a foothold on several bridgeheads,” read the statement. Russia also acknowledged the Ukrainian presence for the first time.

Ukrainian forces liberated Kherson city a year ago, pushing the Russian forces across the Dnipro, where they fortified their positions. The wide waterway has become the frontline, given the difficulty for Ukraine to ferry men and equipment across the water under threat of Russian artillery fire.

But as the war enters another bitter winter any moves on the battlefield come against the backdrop of both sides facing problems with troop numbers amid growing reports of many fleeing being drafted.

One BBC report last week suggested that as many as 200,000 men may have fled Ukraine since the beginning of the war to avoid the draft. Meanwhile, many Russian men have already fled the country, though Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu was at pains last month to point out that there were no plans for an additional mobilisation which could again start the exodus.

“The armed forces have the necessary number of military personnel to conduct the special military operation," insisted Shoigu, still using the Kremlin’s description of the war.

Meanwhile, other reports from the ground tell of a wide ranging campaign to force Ukrainians in occupied territories to become Russian, whereby they are denied healthcare and free movement unless they take up Russian citizenship.

But as winter takes its grip, it’s another kind of frozen conflict that many fear over Ukraine. Wars don’t always end in peace but can also end - of sorts - by way of stalemates often for decades. Korea and Cyprus respectively have had frozen conflicts for 70 and 49 years respectively.

War of attrition

As fears over wavering support for Ukraine grow among its Western allies the conclusion is clear in that they must find ways both to speed up support for Ukraine and to lock it in for the future, in what some say is increasingly looking like a multi-year war of attrition.

For the moment, Ukraine’s recent successes on the battlefield are almost certainly not enough to dispel the growing sense that the war is becoming a lasting stalemate. To date, Western support has underwritten Ukraine’s efforts to defend itself. But it has done no more than that and so far has not been sufficient to enable a Ukrainian victory.

Next spring as the winter recedes, Ukraine may be able gain more territory early if the supplies of advanced weaponry come through that it needs to break the deadlock, something Zelenskyy would undoubtedly welcome.

“Nobody believes in our victory like I do, “ declared the Ukrainian president in a recent Time magazine interview.

But at some point, even Zelenskyy may yet make the decision that it’s best to save whatever gains Ukraine has made and double down and consolidate that position.

These are trying times for Ukraine, a country that has already undergone almost two years of war. With Putin in no mood for any meaningful negotiations and barely a year to a US presential election where if it were to happen today the candidate most likely to enter the White House would be Donald Trump, the times ahead are set to be even more challenging.

If indeed - as seems the case - that public attention and political priorities are shifting and risk the side-lining of Russia’s aggression at this this critical moment, then next year could be Ukraine’s toughest yet in this war.