Every week we wrap up the must-reads from our coverage of the Ukraine war, from news and features to analysis, visual guides and opinion.
Russia declares Kherson withdrawal
Peter Beaumont and Pjotr Sauer covered the moment Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, ordered troops to withdraw from the west bank of the Dnipro River near the strategic southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, the only regional capital that Moscow had captured since it invaded Ukraine in February.
In a humiliating U-turn televised on Wednesday, General Sergei Surovikin, overall commander of Russia’s war operations, called it a “very difficult decision” but conceded that “Kherson cannot be fully supplied and function”.
It is significant blow to the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, only weeks after a high-profile ceremony in Moscow in which he announced the “forever” annexation of the Kherson region, along with three others.
Joe Biden was quick to say the announcement signalled “real problems” in Russia’s military, but Ukrainian officials were more cautious. Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned on Wednesday night that fighting still lay ahead.
One senior adviser to Ukraine’s president said on Thursday that Russia wanted to turn Kherson into a “city of death”. Mykhailo Podolyak accused Russia of mining everything from flats to sewers and planning to shell Kherson from the other side of the Dnipro.
Defence and security editor Dan Sabbagh writes that the prospect of a victory in Kherson is remarkable and timely, but the challenge for Ukraine is now to repeat it against a Russian force trying to dig in.
‘Russia kaput!’ Ukraine troops buoyed up by pullback
Luke Harding visited Ukrainian troops fighting near Snihurivka, a ruined city on the right bank of the Dnipro close to Kherson and occupied since the spring by Russian troops.
“They are panicking,” Serhii Khlan, the deputy head of Kherson oblast council, said. “The occupiers are preparing their withdrawal. They are disabling the bridges to deter our advance.”
One Ukrainian officer described the newly mobilised Russian personnel Moscow has sent to the frontline as untrained, clueless and easy to kill. “They are cannon fodder. One of them went to the toilet in the middle of the night using a flashlight. We identified their tank position and destroyed it,” said Lt Oleh Zelinskiy, a spokesperson for the 63rd Brigade.
“They try to shoot down our drones with automatic weapons. They don’t understand that drones can drop bombs. They are idiots,” he said.
In the trenches, a soldier named Valeriy praised the antitank weapons supplied by the UK. “They are 10 out of 10,” he said, adding: “Russia kaput!” The west must send more air defences, tanks and artillery, he said, in order for Ukraine to kick the Russians out fully.
A change in Putin’s strategy?
Vladimir Putin’s ultimate decision to withdraw appears to mark a significant change in the Russian leader’s thinking, Pjotr Sauer writes.
At the time the decision was announced by his defence minister, the Russian leader was touring a Moscow hospital, making no mention of the monumental decision. “Putin doesn’t want to deliver the bad news and take responsibility for this retreat,” said a former senior defence official, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid reprisal.
However, the announcement also revealed Putin’s readiness to make tactical concessions when pushed against the wall.
“It is wrong to say that Putin never retreats or backs down. This just shows again that Putin can be pragmatic,” said Tatiana Stanovaya, a political analyst at R Politik, an analysis firm. “This decision was clearly a very emotional one for him but he took it. He can be rational.”
A former senior defence official, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid reprisal, said the Kherson withdrawal exposed Moscow’s dire military situation on the ground, which was too blatant for Putin to ignore.
According to the official, who claimed to be in regular contact with his ex-colleagues, Putin intends to “freeze” the conflict while his much-damaged army regroups and trains the large numbers of newly mobilised soldiers that, according to official figures, surpass the 300,000 originally announced.
“Putin is in no rush. He sees this as a longer, large-scale conflict with the west,” the official said. “He is an opportunist by nature. His strategy now is to see how things stand by the end of winter and then reassess the strategy.”
Drone investigation ties Iran to Russian war effort
Ukraine’s military showed Isobel Koshiw evidence that at least some of the Iranian-made drones used by Russia in its war were probably supplied after Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February – a claim Tehran has consistently denied.
In a large room somewhere in Kyiv, Ukrainian military intelligence dismantles captured Iranian drones. The manufacturing date on the propeller of a Mohajer-6, an Iranian spy drone, reads February this year. The date indicates that the drone would have been supplied – if not made – after the invasion, according to Vasyl, a representative of Ukraine’s military intelligence, who cannot give his surname for security reasons. Components from inside the drone also appeared to have Farsi markings.
Vasyl said the technical quality of the drones was surprisingly good. “We think that Russian specialists were involved but that’s just a theory,” he said, commenting on how Iran was able to develop the drones despite being under sanctions for decades. “Either the Iranians went [to Russia] or they have Russian specialists working there.”
Since early October, Iranian technology has helped damage more than 30% of Ukraine’s energy system, according to Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
Patrick Wintour, the Guardian’s diplomatic editor, wrote about how the supply of drones has opened up an internal rift in Iran, reflecting a wider foreign policy debate about the risks of developing close links with Moscow.
‘Completely exposed’ Russian conscripts tell of deadly attack
Pjotr Sauer spoke to Aleksei Agafonov, part of a battalion of new Russian conscripts, who arrived in the Luhansk region on 1 November as part of a battalion. Agafonov described how, within hours of their arrival, Ukrainian artillery lit up the sky and shells started raining down on his unit.
“A Ukrainian drone first flew over us, and after that their artillery started to pound us for hours and hours, nonstop,” Agafonov said in a phone interview on Monday.
“I saw men being ripped apart in front of me, most of our unit is gone, destroyed. It was hell,” he said, adding that his unit’s commanders abandoned them just before the shelling started.
Agafonov was called up on 16 October alongside 570 other conscripts in Voronezh, a city in the south-west of Russia, as part of Vladimir Putin’s nationwide mobilisation push.
According to Agafonov’s estimates, only 130 draftees out of the 570 survived the Ukrainian attack, which would make it the deadliest known incident involving conscripts since the start of the mobilisation drive at the end of September.
“We were completely exposed, we had no idea what to do. Hundreds of us died,” said a second soldier, who asked to remain anonymous. “Two weeks of training doesn’t prepare you for this,” he said, referring to the limited instruction conscripts received prior to being sent to Ukraine.
The incident points to Russia’s willingness to throw hundreds of ill-prepared conscripts on to the frontline in Ukraine’s east while anger grows at home as more coffins come back.
Ukraine maintains morale as winter bites
Adverts on Ukraine’s underground system carry motivational messaging: “Together to the victory”, “Bravery is carrying on”, or “Just a bit more and it will get easier”. Psychologists are invited on to television shows almost daily to offer tips on how to manage anxiety and the breaks are filled with videos in support of the army, Isobel Koshiw writes from Kyiv.
Positive messaging, mental health advice, and examples of how to “do your bit” are all part of the information ecosystem helping Ukrainians sustain their morale throughout the war. Experts say this partly top-down, partly organic approach will play a significant role in supporting Ukrainians through what is likely to be a punishing winter.
TV channels are also running messages on how people can save energy amid government pleas for consumers to reduce usage. Under the slogan “The rules of a warm country”, one video advises people to use alternative methods to keep warm, including using hot-water bottles and cats, as well as getting together with neighbours.
On social media, Ukrainians are sharing infographics on which appliances use the most electricity and videos of the recent trend of making candles-cum-stoves for soldiers in the trenches.
This winter, Ukraine is facing the frightening prospect of sub-zero temperatures with bouts of no electricity, water and even heating.
For the past month, Russia has systematically targeted Ukraine’s critical energy infrastructure with a combination of missiles, rockets, and Iranian-supplied drones.
