Ukraine poised to depart Russian orbit as Russia closes in on Severdonetsk
Ukraine desperately needs more heavy weapons to stave off an inexorable Russian encroachment in the east and to keep counterattacking
Ukraine was poised to become a candidate for the European Union on Thursday, signalling its permanent departure from Russia’s sphere of influence.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed into law the Istanbul Convention on preventing violence against women this week, as part of a broader diplomatic effort to secure unanimity for Ukraine’s candidacy ahead of the June 23-24 EU Summit.
“Every day we prove that we are already in the orbit of European values,” Zelenskyy said. The European Commission described Ukraine as “well advanced in reaching the stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities.”
Key EU members Germany, France and Italy have already said they will back Ukraine’s candidacy.
“The [EU candidacy] status has chiefly a symbolic political character, which underlines that Ukraine belongs to Europe, it doesn’t belong to the Russian world as Russia wished… so it has political weight,” said Panayotis Ioakeimidis, Professor of European Policy at the University of Athens.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, citing security concerns over the encroachment of NATO on former Soviet territory, Ukraine has de-emphasised its NATO aspirations in favour of European ones.
It formally applied for EU membership four days into the invasion. Two weeks later, Zelenskyy told European leaders he didn’t believe NATO membership was a real prospect for Ukraine.
“We have heard for many years about the open doors, but we also heard that we can’t enter those doors. This is the truth, and we simply have to accept it as it is,” he told EU leaders in a video conference.
A Ratings poll among Ukrainians showed high support for both institutions – 76% for NATO membership and 87% for EU membership.
Both NATO and the EU are set to expand as a result of Russia’s war. Finland and Sweden, EU members, applied to join NATO in May. Their candidacies are to be put to a vote at the NATO summit in Madrid at the end of the month.
Russia seeks gains on the ground
Russia is pressing for battlefield victories that would dampen these Western political triumphs. Ukrainian intelligence suggests Russian forces will make a push to take Severdonetsk and the neighbouring Lysychansk - Ukraine’s easternmost free cities - by June 26.
Ukraine continued to frustrate those efforts during the seventeenth week of the war, despite being outgunned by a factor of at least ten-to-one. An estimated 2,500 defenders remained in possession of the Azot chemical plant in Severdonetsk, which makes up a third of the city.
After the fall of Mariupol, the battle has emerged as a new symbol of the tenacity and superior tactics that have enabled Ukraine to keep its better-armed and wealthier neighbour at bay for four months.
Ominous developments have taken place further south, however, which may decide the fate of Severdonetsk and its neighbour Lysychansk.
Russian mercenaries from the Wagner group appear poised to cut off that entire theatre of operations from logistics lifelines. On June 15 they took over the settlement of Vrubivke, throwing Ukrainian defences back to within 10km of the critical Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway.
A further push came on June 21, in which Russian forces seized Mykolaivka and were fighting for Yakovlivka and Bilohorivka, all right next to the highway. Ukrainian defenders still have other lines of supply, but Russia is closing in. Ukraine’s defence minister says he desperately needs more heavy weapons.
There was more bad news for Ukraine on the same day. Russian forces took a series of villages within 10km of Lysychansk. The Russian advance forms a spar thrusting west and threatening a close encirclement of the Lysychansk-Severdonetsk front.
These Russian successes have come at a high cost. The battle for Severdonetsk began in earnest in late May, and has absorbed an estimated Russian force of 10,000 using an enormous amount of artillery. During that month, Ukraine advanced to the Russian border north of Kharkiv, and has thrown Russian forces on the defensive in Kherson. The latest counterattack has been on the garrison at Snake Island in the Black Sea, which Russia has been fortifying.
Lacking Russia’s firepower, Ukraine has gunned for strategic targets that have an asymmetrical effect on Russian combat capability. For example, its Mikhaylo Bilynsky marine brigade says it destroyed a Russian command and observation post in Kherson on June 20, while the Vytautas artillery brigade said it destroyed a Russian command post in Kharkiv on the same day.
The following day, Ukraine’s Centre for Strategic Communications reported that a series of Russian command posts is being moved away from the front. “The Russian command understands that now their [command posts] are in danger at a depth of up to 30km from the front line. Of course, this will only negatively affect the management of troops,” says the ministry.
That management has been lacking. If Ukrainian intelligence reports are accurate, Russian president Vladimir Putin is so unhappy with his commanders’ performances that he is rotating top commanders in Kherson and the Rosguardia – the Russian National Guard.
“Such drastic rotations within the Russian military, if true, are not actions taken by a force on the verge of a major success and indicate ongoing dysfunction in the Kremlin’s conduct of the war,” says the Institute for the Study of War.
Among the rank-and-file, Russian losses have been high. Ukraine estimates them at 34,100. Most recently, Russia is reportedly consolidating two battalion tactical groups from the 5th General Army because they have lost combat capability. It has also reportedly withdrawn the army of the separatist Donbas People’s Republic to restore its combat readiness.
The British defence ministry reports that Russia is prosecuting its war in the east with “increasingly ad hoc and severely undermanned units” advancing on foot.
Low Russian morale is making the job of recruitment hard. Ukraine’s military intelligence published what it says are transcripts of conversations between Russian soldiers. “There were 10-25 people left in the companies,” says one. A company normally consists of five-to-ten dozen soldiers. “Even if you come now as platoon commanders, you have no-one to work with. There are no sappers or crews. There are no leaders. We are already so morally killed.”
Other published conversations recount efforts to be sent home from the front, or complaints about hospital treatment in Russia. An intercept revealed that Russia is bringing in units from Sakhalin island in the Pacific, to fight for a period of six months without rotation.
“The Russian military is offering substantial financial incentives to secure additional recruits with increasing disregard for their age, health, criminal records, and other established service qualifications,” says the ISW. A BBC report concurs, saying conscripts were being sent to the front with a week’s training or less.
Ukrainian morale, on the other hand, remains high. A poll among Ukrainians showed that 93% believe they will prevail against Russia, with two thirds preparing for at least another six months of war.
What support from Europe?
The question is what support Ukraine will receive from its Western family members.
“The clear victory Ukraine seeks, and which mainly London and Washington support, is to eject the last Russian soldier from every square foot of Ukrainian land, including Crimea and the Donbas,” says Ioakeimidis.
Russia occupied the Donbas and Crimea in early 2014, before launching a full-scale invasion on Fberuary 24 this year.
Since then, Britain, Poland and the Baltic States have seen Ukraine’s war of independence as Europe’s war of empowerment, while France and Germany have taken a more cautious approach.
“Returning to pre-February 24 borders is acceptable to old Europe, but ejecting Russians completely is what divides the allies… If Russia is ejected from Crimea and the Donbas, that is a humiliation that could lead to nuclear war,” says Ioakeimidis. “It is impossible.”
Timeline: Week 17 of Russia’s war in Ukraine
June 15
Russian forces attack Ukraine’s easternmost free city of Severdonetsk from several directions, as Ukrainian defenders fight to take back the city centre.
Russian mercenaries from the Wagner group threaten to cut off the Severdonetsk theatre of operations from Ukrainian ground lines of supply when they take over the settlement of Vrubivke, throwing Ukrainian defences back to Vasylivka, Yakovlivka and Berestove - settlements within 10km of the critical Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway.
Satellite imagery shows Russia is bolstering defences on Snake Island in the Black Sea, a position it uses to enforce the naval blockade against Ukraine. Ukraine’s general staff says it destroyed the Russian tug boat Vasily Beh as it was ferrying ammunition to the island.
After a two-day meeting with the Contact Group on Defence of Ukraine and NATO in Brussels, Ukraine’s defence minister Oleksiy Reznikov stresses that his country needs weapons deliveries in order to reach pre-invasion borders.
Russia cuts gas deliveries to Europe through the Nordstream 1 pipeline to 40% of capacity, which will likely result in a cumulative drop of 16 billion cubic metres by the end of the year. A day earlier, Russia had cut delivery to 60% of capacity after Siemens bowed to Canadian sanctions and said it would be unable to deliver overhauled equipment to gas giant Gazprom. Russia has also told Italy’s ENI it will reduce gas deliveries through a different pipeline by 15%. It has shut off gas deliveries altogether to Poland, Bulgaria, Denmark, Finland, France and the Netherlands. Germany and Italy are two of Europe’s biggest importers of Russian gas. The latest cuts also affect Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
June 16
Ukrainian commander in chief Valeryi Zalyzhnyi says Russia is attacking the Donbas from nine directions simultaneously.
The commander of Ukraine’s southern forces, Andriy Kovalchuk, calls for longer-than-30km range artillery to win the war there. “We need long-range artillery that will exceed 30 km… with such weapons, everything will be much more efficient and faster. "
NATO secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg calls the war in Ukraine a “game-changer” and “the greatest threat to our security in decades,” at the end of a two-day summit of NATO members plus Finland, Sweden, Georgia and the European Union. Stoltenberg says the upcoming NATO Summit in Madrid (June 28-30) will address the need for higher defence budgets, more forward deployed combat formations and a new Strategic Concept addressing challenges from Russia and, for the first time, China.
The UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights records 4,481 confirmed civilian deaths as a result of Russia’s invasion. Ukraine believes the real number to be in the tens of thousands.
June 17
Russian forces shell settlements south of the twin cities of Lysychansk and Severdonetsk in an ongoing effort to encircle and isolate them. Russian forces are unable to seize control of the logistics lifeline to the cities.
Luhansk governor Serhiy Haidai reports that 538 civilians are holed up in the Azot chemical plant, including 38 children, along with defenders, whose number is estimated at 2,500. Evacuating the civilians is impossible, Haidai says.
On the southern front, Ukrainian aviation bombs Russian positions 45km southeast of the line of contact in Kherson city and Bersylav.
A Russian warship twice violates Danish territorial waters in the Baltic Sea, as senior lawmakers and businesspeople hold an annual gathering on an island. “A deeply irresponsible, gross and completely unacceptable Russian provocation,” Danish foreign minister Jeppe Kofod wrote on Twitter. “We must accept that the Baltic Sea is becoming a high-tension area,” Danish defence minister Morten Bodskov says. Denmark has supplied anti-tank launchers and Harpoon anti-ship missiles to Ukraine.
Addressing the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, Russian president Vladimir Putin says US-led sanctions against Russia will fail. “If some ‘rebel’ state cannot be suppressed or pacified, they try to isolate that state, or ‘cancel’ it, to use their modern term,” Putin says. “This is the nature of the current round of Russophobia in the West, and the insane sanctions against Russia. They are crazy and, I would say, thoughtless. They are unprecedented in the number of them or the pace the West churns them out at.” Putin says, “the economic blitzkrieg against Russia was doomed to fail from the beginning.”
The European Commission publishes its opinion recommending that Ukraine be granted candidate status to join the European Union. “Ukraine overall is well advanced in reaching the stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities,” it says.
The leaders of France, Germany, Italy and Romania offer their full support to Ukraine’s candidacy during a visit to Kiev.
The US Pentagon announces a new $1bn package of armaments for Ukraine, bringing the total supplied to $6.3bn.
In an address to the Western Balkans, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Ukraine’s defence is of critical importance to Europe.
June 18
Russia makes marginal advances in the eastern and southern Severdonetsk suburbs of Metolkine and Syrotyne, but is repulsed.
Russian forces make an attempt on Nyrkove, a settlement 5km from the Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway that is the Ukrainian main line of supply.
Lithuania bans the transit through its territory of goods to the enclave of Kaliningrad that are subject to European Union sanctions, infuriating Russia.
June 19
Russia claims to have captured the settlement of Metolkine near Severdonetsk. It fails to capture villages south of Lysychansk, in an effort to encircle the twin cities of Lysychansk and Severdonetsk. Russia continues to throw enormous resources into capturing the Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway, bombing Ukrainian positions to the east of it with artillery, airstrikes and missiles.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy visits frontline troops on the southern front of the Kherson region. “We will not give away the south to anyone, we will return everything that's ours and the sea will be Ukrainian and safe,” he says.
British premier Boris Johnson calls for more weaponry to be sent to Ukraine fast, in an article in the Sunday Times. NATO secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg warned the newspaper Bild am Sonntag, “We must prepare for the fact that it could take years. We must not let up in supporting Ukraine,” he said.
Ukraine’s military intelligence says Russia still refuses to admit the deaths of 26 out of 27 sailors allegedly killed on board the Moskva to their families. Ukraine sank the Moskva on April 14.
June 20
Ukraine reports heavy fighting in Severdonetsk’s industrial district, where it says it still control the 30% of the city comprised by the Azot chemical plant. Ukraine confirms Russian forces’ capture of the village of Metolkine, an eastern suburb of Severdonetsk.
Russian forces are also trying to approach the city of Lysychansk from the south to isolate it and Severdonetsk. Russian efforts to take two villages south of Lysychansk, Myrna Dolyna and Bila Hora, are repulsed.
Ukrainian deputy defence minister Hanna Malyar says Ukrainian forces have come very close to the Russian border in the process of reclaiming the northern Kharkiv region.
Ukraine creates a website with the profiles of hundreds of alleged Russian war criminals, called The Book of Executioners. It says it is investigating as many as 1,700 individual Russian servicemen for potential war crimes.
Deputy premier Iryna Vereshchuk says 1.2mn Ukrainians have been deported to Russia, including 240,000 children.
The number of civilians allegedly executed by Russian forces in the Kiev region reaches, 1,332.
June 21
Fighting continues in Severdonetsk, where Ukrainian forces claim to have recaptured the southern suburb of Sirotyne.
Russian forces take the villages of Toshkivka, Ustinivka, Myrna Dolyna, Pidlisne and possibly Bila Hora, all on the western bank of the Siversky Donets river and within 10km of Lysychansk. The Russian advance forms a spar thrusting west and threatening an encirclement of the Lysychansk-Severdonetsk front.
Russian forces are also successful further south, seizing Mykolaivka and Vrubivka, both next to the Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway, one of the main supply routes for Ukrainian troops in Lysychansk-Severdonetsk. The Ukrainians still have a supply route through Siversk, further north.
On the southern front, Russian forces may have taken back the eastern bank of the Inhulets river, which had formed a Ukrainian bridgehead.
Zelenskyy says if Ukraine does not resist Russia, other former Soviet republics may come under threat of occupation.