Russian ground advances across eastern Ukraine appear to be small at first glance — only 1.2 square kilometers on an average per day near the city of Kupiansk. Or, as the Institute for the Study of War notes, they have gained a grand total of 454 square kilometers since January 2024 when Moscow first attempted to envelop the strategic city near the Russia border.
Meanwhile, to the south, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion has only managed to advance 17 kilometers toward Lyman since January 2025. But the devil is in the details.
Like the salients aimed at menacing Kupiansk and Lyman, six other Russian salients are slowly coming together as mutually supporting operations expanding from the Donbas in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine.
The pace remains slow — Putin’s daily gains are traversed with boots, not tires. Yet now there is a new purpose behind them. If you zoom out and view each of these salients along a north-south axis across eastern Ukraine, you can see how they are increasingly mutually supporting one another.
They are also reflective of a change in Russian strategy. Moscow is avoiding a direct attack on what has become known as the “fortress belt” of the Donetsk Oblast. He is instead committed to what the institute deems a “multi-year operation to envelop the southern half of the fortress belt.”
In non-military terms, Putin’s battlefield doctrine is crystal clear. Putin is unwilling to enter into a ceasefire because he is still convinced he can outlast Washington and Brussels and conquer all of Ukraine. In Russian warfare, the 1,034,460 casualties are just the cost of doing business.
The spotlight is trained on Russian ballistic missile and drone strikes on Ukrainian cities, but the ground war — the close fight — continues with little exposure from the mainstream media. “Flying under the radar” is the appropriate military term — and the bad result is what we common describe as “boiling the frog.”
If Putin’s red tide is left unchecked, over time these marginal Russian territorial advances risk gaining exponential momentum. If viewed through this narrow prism, they are very much akin to a land-version of a red tide that is slowly spreading and bringing total death and destruction to all of eastern Ukraine.
As it is, Ukraine — especially eastern Ukraine — is already the most mined country in the world and has been since 2023. Now, out of necessity, Kyiv alongside Finland, Poland and the Baltic states, has withdrawn from the Ottawa Convention, the landmark 1997 agreement banning the use of anti-personnel mines.
Beyond just Ukraine, Putin’s red tide is threatening to spread throughout Europe – and arguably, it already has spread globally via Putin’s widespread use of paramilitary forces across the Sahel in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The results are always the same: toppled democracies, the plundering of Ukraine’s and other countries’ national resources (especially their rare earth mineral reserves), widespread destruction and leveled cities — including Bakhmut and Avdiivka early in the war and now Pokrovsk and countless other small Ukrainian cities and settlements as well.
Team Trump’s decision to resume defensive arm sales to Ukraine comes at a critical time. Yes, for now, much of the media’s attention has understandably been focused on both Russian and Ukrainian aerial attacks.
Yet, while Ukraine’s deep fight has been against legitimate military targets including June’s Operation Spiderweb – smuggled Ukrainian drones spectacularly attacked and destroyed dozens of Russian bombers across Russia – Putin has intentionally targeted Ukrainian civilians.
Even First Lady Melania Trump has taken notice. As Trump admitted, his wife pointed out to him that every time the president has a “perfect call” with Putin, the Russian dictator ends the call by bombing another Ukrainian city.
Wars are won with boots on the ground — by occupying terrain. Aerial bombardments merely set the conditions for winning that fight. The war in Ukraine will be won or lost across the 600-mile frontline in eastern Ukraine. Defensive weapons can help, but they will not win the war.
As we have warned, the fighting and bloodshed will not stop unless Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his generals have more artillery rounds and ample offensive weapons to engage and interdict Russian forces before they can enter eastern Ukraine, as well as precision deep strike weapons to defeat the weapon systems killing Ukrainian citizens in their homes.
Nor will it be enough to fend off the Russian advances that are slowly eating away at the value of Trump’s much-vaunted rare earth minerals deal with Ukraine. It is estimated that 50 percent of Ukraine’s $11.5 trillion of rare earth minerals are located in eastern Ukraine — and much of that is already occupied by Russia.
Ukraine fully understands that its independent future depends upon aligning with Team Trump, and that its rare earth minerals deal must underpin that relationship now and after the war era.
Zelensky’s nomination of Yulia Svyrydenko as Ukraine’s new prime minister is proof of that understanding. Svyrydenko was instrumental in finalizing the rare earth minerals deal that was signed by Trump and Zelensky.
One of Svyrydenko’s first acts will likely be to remind Team Trump that Putin in June seized a valuable lithium mine in Donetsk. It too was small — just 100 acres — but its lithium reserve is vast, and until June it was part of Trump’s deal.
Zelensky’s recall of Oksana Markarova, Ukraine’s ambassador to the U.S., is yet another step in the right direction. Markarova has long been criticized by Republicans on Capitol Hill after House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) accused her of supporting the candidacy of former Vice President Kamala Harris.
For the moment, Putin is winning the race for the title of Don of the Donbas. To end the conflict, team Trump must turn back Putin’s red tide in Ukraine.
Mark Toth writes on national security and foreign policy. Col. (Ret.) Jonathan Sweet served 30 years as an Army intelligence officer.
