Ukrainians expect Russia to launch a fresh offensive to strengthen its
negotiating position
[March 29, 2025]
By SAMYA KULLAB
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian forces are preparing to launch a fresh
military offensive in the coming weeks to maximize the pressure on
Ukraine and strengthen the Kremlin's negotiating position in ceasefire
talks, Ukrainian government and military analysts said.
The move could give Russian President Vladimir Putin every reason to
delay discussions about pausing the fighting in favor of seeking more
land, the Ukrainian officials said, renewing their country's repeated
arguments that Russia has no intention of engaging in meaningful
dialogue to end the war.
With the spring fighting season drawing near, the Kremlin is eyeing a
multi-pronged push across the 1,000-kilometer (621-mile) front line,
according to the analysts and military commanders.
Citing intelligence reports, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy
said Russia is getting ready for new offensives in the northeast Sumy,
Kharkiv and Zaporizizhia regions.
“They’re dragging out the talks and trying to get the U.S. stuck in
endless and pointless discussions about fake ‘conditions’ just to buy
time and then try to grab more land,” Zelenskyy said Thursday in a visit
to Paris. “Putin wants to negotiate over territory from a stronger
position.”
Two G7 diplomatic officials in Kyiv agreed with that assessment. They
spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to
brief the press.
Russia has effectively rejected a U.S. proposal for an immediate and
full 30-day halt in the fighting, and the feasibility of a partial
ceasefire on the Black Sea was thrown into doubt after Kremlin
negotiators imposed far-reaching conditions.
Battlefield success is clearly in Putin's mind.
“On the entire front line, the strategic initiative is completely in the
hands of the Russian armed forces,” Putin said Thursday at a forum in
the Arctic port of Murmansk. "Our troops, our guys are moving forward
and liberating one territory after another, one settlement after
another, every day.”
Kremlin forces keep pressing forward
Ukrainian military commanders said Russia recently stepped up attacks to
improve its tactical positions ahead of the expected broader offensive.
“They need time until May, that’s all,” said Ukrainian military analyst
Pavlo Narozhnyi, who works with soldiers and learns about intelligence
from them.
In the north, Russian and North Korean soldiers have nearly deprived
Kyiv of an essential bargaining chip by retaking most of Russia’s Kursk
region, where Ukrainian soldiers staged a daring incursion last year.
Battles have also escalated along the eastern front in Donetsk and
Zaporizhzhia.
A concern among some commanders is whether Russia might divert
battle-hardened forces from Kursk to other parts of the east.
“It will be hard. The forces from Kursk will come on a high from their
wins there," said a Ukrainian battalion commander in the Donetsk region,
who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe his concerns.
“They are preparing offensive actions on the front that should last from
six to nine months, almost all of 2025,” said Ukrainian military analyst
Oleksii Hetman, who has connections to the military's general staff.
Fighting intensifies on parts of the front line
Russia entered negotiations with a clear advantage in the war. Now,
after recapturing 80% of its territory in the Kursk region ahead of
talks, its forces have intensified their fighting across other parts of
the front line.
“The number of clashes on the front line is not decreasing," Hetman
said. "If they wanted to stop the war, their actions certainly don’t
show it.”
Russia ramped up reconnaissance missions to find and destroy firing
positions, drone systems and other capabilities that could impede a
future onslaught, two Ukrainian commanders said.
“These can be all signs that an attack is being prepared in the near
future,” Hetman said.
Fighting also intensified in the eastern city of Pokrovsk, one of
Ukraine’s main defensive strongholds and a key logistics hub in the
Donetsk region. Its capture would bring Russia closer to its stated aim
of capturing the entire region.
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A resident watches as his neighbour cleans up the damaged apartment
in a multi-storey house after a Russian night drone attack in Kyiv,
Ukraine, Sunday, March 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
“The Russians were significantly exhausted over the past two months.
During 10 days of March, they took a sort of pause,” military
spokesman Maj. Viktor Trehubov said of the situation in Pokrovsk. In
mid-March, the attack resumed. “This means the Russians have simply
recovered.”
Russia increases reconnaissance missions
A Ukrainian soldier with the call sign “Italian” said Russia was
conducting intensive reconnaissance in his area of responsibility in
the Pokrovsk region. Radio intercepts and intelligence show a
buildup of forces in the area around Selidove, a city in the
Pokrovsk region, and the creation of ammunition reserves, he said.
The buildup includes large armored vehicles, and the many new call
signs overheard in radio transmissions suggest that fresh forces are
coming in, he said.
Further south, a military blog run by Mikhail Zvinchuk, a former
officer of the Russian Defense Ministry’s press section, noted last
week that Russian troops recently unleashed a new offensive west of
Orikhiv in the Zaporizhzhia region.
The offensive will allow Russian forces to move toward the city of
Zaporizhzhia and "force the enemy to redeploy its troops from other
sectors, leaving Robotyne and Mala Tokmachka badly protected,” the
blog known as Rybar said, adding that the new offensive “could be
the first step toward the liberation of the Zaporizhzhia region.”
On Friday, Vladyslav Voloshyn, a spokesman for the Southern Defense
Forces of Ukraine, said the situation in the region is fraught after
Russia amassed more forces to conduct assaults with small groups of
infantry.
“The tactic of using these small groups brings results to Russia" in
other parts of the front line, he said.
Russian analysts project optimism that a future offensive will
succeed.
“Both sides are actively preparing for the spring-summer campaign,”
Sergey Poletaev, a Moscow-based military analyst, wrote in a recent
commentary. “There’s a growing sense that the Ukrainian forces may
be struggling to prepare for it adequately. Despite being worn down
from combat, the Russian army has a real chance of achieving
decisive success in the next six months to a year. This could lead
to the collapse of Ukrainian defenses.”
Little progress reported at negotiating table
Meanwhile at the negotiating table, Russian demands have curtailed
the results of much-anticipated negotiations brokered by the U.S.
Earlier this month, after Russia effectively turned down the U.S.
proposal for a complete, monthlong halt in the fighting, Moscow
tentatively agreed to a partial ceasefire on Black Sea shipping
routes.
But that agreement was quickly cast into doubt by Russia's
insistence on far-reaching conditions that its state bank be
reconnected to the SWIFT international payment system, something
Kyiv and the EU rejected outright.
Along the front line, the reported ups and downs of the talks fuel
frustration and worry.
“No one believes in them,” said the Ukrainian soldier known as
Italian, who spoke on the condition that he be identified only by
his call sign in keeping with military protocol. “But there is still
hope that the conflict will move in another direction. Everyone is
waiting for some changes in the combat zone because it is not good
for us now. We really don’t want to admit that."
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Associated Press journalists Volodymyr Yurchuk and Dmytro Zhyhinas
contributed to this report.
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