For weeks now, Russia’s main axis of attack in southern Donbas has been faltering. Ukraine is conducting local counterattacks near Pokrovsk, Toretsk, and Chasiv Yar and is unexpectedly pushing back against Russia.
That progress has been aided by technical evolution; Ukraine has extended the range of its fiber optic drones by several kilometers, and these cannot be disrupted by Russian electronic warfare. This allows Ukraine to disable Russian artillery pieces and logistical facilities.
Russian logistics around Pokrovsk and large parts of southern Donbas are now dysfunctional and chaotic. It no longer has the upper hand in terms of artillery there and has too few armored vehicles for its infantry.
Ukraine has also succeeded in significantly reducing the accuracy of the feared glide bombs that have done so much damage over the last year. Its electronic warfare systems have been used to interfere with the Russian GLONASS satellite navigation used by the bombs, which are as heavy as 3.4 tons and are launched beyond the reach of Ukrainian anti-aircraft systems,
Ballistic missiles, which use inertial navigation systems, are much harder to stop. Russia has employed these missiles against smaller towns lacking advanced anti-missile systems and mass nightly drone attacks using increasingly dense formations of the Iranian-designed craft to saturate air defenses.
The effects were clear on April 13, Palm Sunday, as people in the northeastern town of Sumy were attending church services. Russia launched a pair of Iskander-M missiles at the heart of the city, one following shortly after the other — a so-called double tap attack perfected by Russian and Syrian forces during the war there — and armed with a fragmentation warhead of maximize casualties. Some 34 people were killed and 117 wounded.
The bloodshed appeared to be part of Russia’s preparations for a multi-month offensive from Russian territory into the Sumy district. The city, close to the border, is thus threatened with similar pressure as Kharkiv from May 2024.
Sumy region is not one of the Ukrainian territories to which the Kremlin lays permanent claim (Crimea plus four eastern regions). The attacks thus serve as a reminder that whatever Russia says, it continues to claim the whole of Ukraine and is trying to depopulate whole zones (as with its so-called human safaris in Kherson, where it hunts civilians using drones).
The attempt to conquer Sumy will fail, as it did in Kharkiv. But Russian generals hope the fighting will relieve pressure on its forces in the Donbas and suggest Russian strength in the information space.
Ukraine needs a lot of cheap drone defense, air defense systems, and more fighter jets to support air defense.
It needs more investment in the defense industry, joint ventures, and the spending of Western military aid directly on Ukrainian companies.
Ukraine needs support for the construction of fortifications, minelaying, and building decoys in the Sumy region and on other sections of the front.
Ukraine needs support and financing for the initiative to purchase weapons, ammunition, and equipment in the US with European money, provided the corresponding capabilities are only available there. This applies to spare parts and ammunition for ground-based systems like HIMARS and ATACMS, as well as air defense systems.
More than a month after Ukraine announced its readiness to accept an unconditional ceasefire, Russia is still not prepared to accept a ceasefire but has instead launched a new wave of attacks.
The criminal Russian attacks with ballistic missiles with cluster munitions in busy city centers, with many dead civilians, must have consequences. Germany and the EU-Europeans should block ships of the Russian shadow fleet and cancel Schengen visas for Russian diplomatic passports.
The Palm Sunday massacre is already having an effect in Europe. Germany’s Chancellor-elect Friedrich Merz said on the day of the attack that he is willing to send longer-range Taurus missiles to Ukraine, something adamantly opposed by his predecessor. Officials will now consult Germany’s allies on the issue, he said. This could be combined with the dispatch of Swedish Gripen fighter aircraft.
A European initiative should bring financial, economic, humanitarian aid and high-level visitors to the cities of Sumy, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Dnipro, and Odesa to counter the Russian campaign of expulsion and truthless claims.
Exploiting the Trump administration’s goodwill, Putin wants to make Ukraine’s partners feel weak and helpless. Europe and the US should surprise the Kremlin with strength and determination.
Nico Lange is a Non-resident Senior Fellow with the Transatlantic Defense and Security Program at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA). He is also a Senior Fellow at the Munich Security Conference in Berlin and Munich and teaches military history at the University of Potsdam. Lange served as Chief of Staff at the German Ministry of Defense from 2019-2022.
Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions expressed on Europe’s Edge are those of the author alone and may not represent those of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis. CEPA maintains a strict intellectual independence policy across all its projects and publications.
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