"The counteroffensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU), widely
hyped by Ukrainian and Western officials since the beginning of the
year, has been going on for nearly a month. Since June 4, Kiev's forces
have been trying to advance on the southern section of the frontlines in
Zaporozhye Region and in the western part of the Donetsk People’s
Republic (DPR).
The anticipated ‘blitzkrieg’ strategy was not
successful and the Ukrainian offensive became 
stuck in positional
warfare, losing a lot of the military equipment provided to it by the
West. By the end of June, Kiev managed to occupy a mere eight villages,
but was not able to reach the main Russian fortifications. Russian Federation built a deep line of defense, a task which involved
civilian workers. Near Melitopol, it constructed a defense line in two
echelons with a forefield and two security zones. Tokmak and the village
of Ocherevatoye were prepared for point defense.
The Vremyevsky salient – the most vulnerable section of defense
On June 4, Ukraine launched its counteroffensive with a distracting (later to become the main) strike
on the Vremyevsky salient. Apparently, this was intended to pull out
the Russian Army’s reserves and draw them into battle in this area.
These attacks continued for several days but were unsuccessful.
During
the second attack on June 10, Ukraine’s army acted more effectively,
and by June 13, Russia retreated from the villages of Novodarovka,
Neskuchnoye, Storozhevoye, Blagodatnoye, and Makarovka. On June 26, the
Ukrainians took control of Rovnopol and some positions in the fields on
the way to Novodonetsky and Priyutnoye.
In the course of three weeks of fighting, the AFU captured six villages,
which were all evacuated ahead of time. It should be noted that the
Vryemyevsky salient was initially extremely inconvenient for Russian
defense – surrounded by Ukrainian forces from the flanks,....June 7, the AFU started moving in the direction of Melitopol.
Initially, this was the task of the 128th Mountain Assault Brigade, a
unit which had earlier suffered many casualties. Going in the direction
of Vasilevka, the brigade tried to occupy the village of Lobkovo.
The
next day, the AFU launched an offensive supposedly headed by the 47th
Mechanized Brigade and armed with the new German Leopard tanks. This
attack ended badly for the Ukrainians – the operation failed, Western
equipment was destroyed, and Russia published damaging video footage which went viral online.The Ukrainian online resource DeepState, which shows a live map of the
war, temporarily closed the comments section and later published an “uncomfortable analysis” of the events, slamming Ukrainian
officials and politicians who claimed that their army had not launched a
counteroffensive yet. According to Ukrainian political observers, the
behavior of the officials devalued the lives of the country's soldiers.
Increased pressure on the front forced the Russian Army to retreat from
two other villages – Lobkovoe and Pyatikhatka, where lengthy battles
took place. Presently, the Russian Army is holding its defensive
positions near the village of Zherebyanka.
To the east, the AFU was able to advance through the fields in the
direction of the village of Rabotino, which is on the road from Orekhov
to Tokmak. Both sides have suffered losses but Ukraine is also losing a
vital asset – time – as the pace of the counteroffensive slows down.....the Russian Air Force is constantly attacking UFU warehouses and staging areas.
Every two weeks, Ukrainian journalist Roman Shrike polls his Telegram
subscribers on the estimated duration of the war. On June 15, the option
that the war will continue for ‘more than another year’ received over 50% of votes for the first time." RT
