As forecast, the focus of hostilities in Ukraine has shifted away from Kyiv and the north towards the south and east of the country where Russia is expected to launch an offensive any day now. In addition to the siege of the port city of Mariupol, where Ukrainian marines are reported to have surrendered in large numbers this week, people in the eastern region of Donbas are bracing for a major attack.
The battle for the Donbas region will be different in character from the urban warfare seen so far in the war in Ukraine. The area has seen fighting on and off since 2014 with more than 13,000 people killed, despite efforts to reach a negotiated settlement. Now the fighting is forecast to be fiercer than ever.
It will be a “knife fight”, writes Frank Ledwidge, an expert in military strategy, conducted around salients, or geographic and strategic “bulges” in which Ukrainian forces risk being caught and cut off. Ledwidge predicts the next phase will be bloody and protracted, more like the manoeuvre battles of the second world war than the fighting that has taken place up until now.
