The Ukrainian military is abandoning the battle tactics of its Western trainers and returning to a strategy of longer-range stand-offs against Russian forces, the New York Times reported on Wednesday. However, it remains unclear whether Kiev has enough ammunition to sustain such a plan.
Since it began in early June, Ukraine’s ongoing counteroffensive has been acknowledged by officials in Washington and Kiev as disappointingly slow at best, and a failure at worst. Attacking through Russian minefields without air support, Ukraine’s Western-supplied tanks and armored vehicles have been picked off by Russian aviation and artillery, and Moscow estimates that the offensive has cost Kiev at least 30,000 men.
At the forefront of the offensive were Ukraine’s nine NATO-trained brigades, one of which – the 47th Mechanized Brigade – reportedly lost 30% of its American-made Bradley Infantry Fighting vehicles in two weeks.