The counteroffensive actions of the Ukrainian Armed Forces are forcing Russian occupiers to redeploy their defending forces in the western part of the Zaporizhzhia region, where Ukrainian soldiers have weakened their defenses. This degradation of Russian military strength presents an opportunity for a breakthrough by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which could prove decisive.
Such conclusions have been drawn by analysts at the Institute for the Study of War.
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I think Russian generals would mutiny before signing a death wish for their country by launching a nuke.
Either way, this war has already been a massive failure for russia. They were planning to take Kyiv in a week, annex some territory, and possibly install a puppet government before going back to business as usual.
If the war ended today with a Russian victory, it would be a pyrrhic victory for them. I feel like anything short of that will end with the overthrow of Putin. Their best chance of success is to keep meddling with the west in an attempt to sabotage Ukraine’s support.
I think the slowness makes it less likely that Ukraine will be nuked. If each Russian loss is a relatively small one then escalation to nukes keeps being an unwarranted escalation.
If you really want to watch out for it, then we might see an elevated risk when the Russian defense lines crumble and we see another rapid advance like what happened with Kharkiv.