U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that while Ukraine has reconquered half the territory that Russia initially seized in its invasion, Kyiv faced a "a very hard fight" to win back more.

WASHINGTON, July 23 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that while Ukraine has reconquered half the territory that Russia initially seized in its invasion, Kyiv faced a “a very hard fight” to win back more.

“It’s already taken back about 50% of what was initially seized,” Blinken said in an interview to CNN on Sunday.

“These are still relatively early days of the counteroffensive. It is tough,” he said, adding: “It will not play out over the next week or two. We’re still looking I think at several months.”

Hopes that Ukraine could quickly clear Moscow’s forces from its territory following the launch of a summer counteroffensive are fading as Kyiv’s troops struggle to breach heavily entrenched Russian positions in the country’s south and east.

Late last month President Volodymyr Zelenskiy was quoted as saying that progress against Russian forces was “slower than desired” but that Kyiv would not be pressured into speeding it up.

  • Arotrios@kbin.social
    9016·
    1 year ago

    I love boosting good news, especially given the enormous amount of Russian disinformation surrounding the “failure” and “slow going” of the offensive.

    It was never going to be quick, or easy, and I think that the extraordinary successes of earlier Ukrainian counter-offensives set expectations higher than the reality on the ground.

    But in the balance, Ukraine went from having half its territory captured by the 2nd strongest army in the world to knocking them back on their knees and retaking half of what was lost in the space of less than two years. That’s an incredible success in the face of overwhelming odds, even with NATO and EU support. One only has to look at the Russian takeovers in Eastern Europe after WWII to get a sense of how unique it is that Ukraine was able to not only resist, but drive back the invaders.

    From California and all Americans who support freedom, Слава Україні!

    • oatscoop@midwest.social
      12·
      1 year ago

      It also ignores war aren’t always won by taking and holding territory: many are won by simply outlasting the enemy’s willingness or ability to maintain the conflict.

    • GiuseppeAndTheYeti@midwest.socialEnglish
      27·
      1 year ago

      They’re being trained on F-16s via Poland if I’m not mistaken. But those F-16s aren’t going to make things much easier either. They’d likely be targeted by S-400s behind the Russian lines, so their operational range while being in friendly airspace is probably pretty limited. The slow pace than hoped for is mostly affected by the mines that Russia laid and entrenched soldiers. The drone-dropped grenades are more effective at dealing with entrenched soldiers than an F-16 having to evade redar and SAMs.

  • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3119·
    1 year ago

    This uhh. This is just nonsense right? I’m not aware of Ukraine having broken any of the defensive first lines let alone past any of the dragon’s teeth lines. There’s 2 more lines beyond those. Getting past these lines is necessary before getting even 10%, let alone 50%.

    Or are they talking about something that happened much earlier? That’s really confusing too because anyone that’s been watching the map trackers knows nothing close to 50% ever happened. Certainly some pushback several months ago but hardly 50% ???

      • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
        219·
        1 year ago

        Aight so like 15-20% and he’s referring to something that happened ages ago then. I thought it was kinda weird, I guess they’re not happy about how the current counteroffensive is going either and this kind of statement helps generate headlines that stop people’s support dropping whether it’s actually true or not.

        I needed to ask because I wasn’t really sure if I’d just missed something incredibly major somehow.

    • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.worldEnglish
      42·
      1 year ago

      I mean looking at this video - which is 4 months old now, too - I am eyeballing it but kinda seems like yeah, it could be 40%+? So now it’s 50% maybe, sure.

      • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
        919·
        1 year ago

        Huh I guess you can get kinda close to 40% ? I suppose most of us aren’t including the north east withdrawal because it’s largely seen as a distraction and not really a “front” that actually happened, and Kyiv feels like it happened 10 years ago now. It makes sense that Blinken would include the stuff most people wouldn’t think of as having been Ukraine “taking it back” because the bigger number looks good in media.

        • chowder@lemmy.oneEnglish
          177·
          1 year ago

          Lmfao " Kyiv was a feint" do you really believe that? Dude they lost so many VDV the BBC did a piece on it. To say it was just a distraction is bullshit Russian propaganda. They attacked, failed, then retreated and reinforced the areas they were more successful.

          • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1120·
            1 year ago

            Nah I’m not talking about Kyiv. The north east was hardly any troops, no supply, just empty roads that were taken with no resistance. And then they withdrew with no resistance too after the Kyiv attack failed. My point being that it’s hardly worth considering it as having been “taken” in the first place, and most don’t. The Kyiv part itself is fair to bring up, just easy to forget given how long ago it was.

            Anyway people should be more concerned about the new russian offensive getting hyped up. A lot of rumours stirring around that look similar to the rumours before Bahkmut right now.

            • chowder@lemmy.oneEnglish
              65·
              1 year ago

              No resistance? They sieged Chernihiv from February 25-March 31.

              You count Bakhmut as a Russian victory? Nobody won Bakhmut, Russian expended a massive ammout of manpower and resources for nothing. The front didn’t change in any meaningful way, hell the fact they are struggled so much to reclaim a town they captured in 2014 should tell you how bad things are for Russia. Seriously dude they drafted 300,000 and still the only way they made progress was by throwing prisoners at it.

              Also spoiler alert they have been on the offensive this entire time. The only competent people have been removed from power. The one to order defensive lines made and mines laid backed Pringlez. Pringlez is also gone now so yeah I don’t really see this offensive playing out any way.

              • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
                85·
                1 year ago

                I didn’t say anything about victories. I couldn’t give a shit about who is winning or losing I would prefer the fighting to stop immediately it’s all a waste of lives and the destruction of families.

                I don’t think we should be counting Pringlez as gone, Wagner are training Belarus troops I’m not convinced that he isn’t involved in that given that he moved to Belarus.~

                What I’m talking about is the 100k troops and 1k tanks that have been built up for the new Russian push. We might see a big arrow offensive again instead of this attrition stuff that has been going on. It’s all speculation obviously but the telegrams feel a lot like they did before Bahkmut when the rumours were circling that it was going to be next, this makes me think that this is actually going to happen fairly soon. But hey I’ve been wrong before so ehhh

                Bit annoying that just having any kind of conversation here gets you downvoted for apparently no reason at all. Weird userbase in this comm, doesn’t happen anywhere else on lemmy.

                • SCB@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  67·
                  1 year ago

                  I downvoted you because you’re saying false/insane things. That’s the point of downvotes.

    • Worstdriver@lemmy.worldEnglish
      67·
      1 year ago

      This is since the invasion began, counting from Russia’s deepest gains into Ukrainian territory. So, this is everything that Ukraine has managed to do against the world’s second largest military. While currently there haven’t been any spectacular gains, the Ukraine has been steadily grinding the land back from the invaders and combined the amount now adds up to 50% retaken.

      Meaning the job is half done, but also half finished.

      • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
        134·
        1 year ago

        This boundless optimism is so strange. Using something that was so long ago now for propaganda in the present is super misleading. Until we see a breakthrough of the defensive lines, literally just 1 layer of a line would be a good start let alone all 3 layers I can’t really agree with anyone that thinks much is going to happen from the ukrainian side. If/when that does happen I’d be happy to reassess.

        • rambaroo@lemmy.worldEnglish
          16·
          1 year ago

          Lol “so long ago”. Most of it wasn’t even a year ago dude, and the article is pretty clear about the timeline being discussed.

          • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
            71·
            1 year ago

            Most of it wasn’t even a year ago

            Yes it was? The withdrawal from the north was march30-april6.

            I’m not a dude.

        • Worstdriver@lemmy.worldEnglish
          49·
          1 year ago

          Not really. It’s an overall view of the progress to date. The liberation of Ukrainian territory is an continuous and ongoing process and it’s half done. The only super misleading part has been thinking that Russia would give up on its latest bout of imperialism so quickly. America is going to keep supplying Ukraine with weapons because by doing so they are absolutely wrecking their #1 enemy on the cheap.

          Russia is fucked. Even if they beat Ukraine their invasion has caused NATO to expand its direct contact with Russia from over 1000km. Russian threw away decades of goodwill and cause economic cooperation with the West to completely die out. Russia was on the verge of being Europe’s OPEC and all of that potential to make their nation better has been utterly lost.

          No one is going to trust Russia for at least another full generation.

          • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
            133·
            1 year ago

            Mate I don’t know why you’ve said half this shit. I talked about none of that. It’s like you’re talking at me rather than with me. US weapons? Who said anything about america? It’s like you’re reading off a script instead of actually responding to what I’ve said. I’m glad that you’re really excited to see loads of people die but like, actually talk to me instead of soapboxing.

              • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
                91·
                1 year ago

                Maybe. It’s a bizarre response that hardly has anything to do with what I was saying, I just assumed it was someone that really wanted to say all these things that we’ve heard from neoliberals and the media like a billion times already. Like, ok?

      • raresbears@iusearchlinux.fyiEnglish
        73·
        1 year ago

        The job is not at all half finished. There is a massive difference between taking back territory Russia strategically chose to withdraw from following their failure to advance further and taking back territory they have claimed as an integral part of their nation and will fight tooth and nail to defend.

          • kokiriflute@lemmy.worldEnglish
            67·
            1 year ago

            You only brought up nazis being in Ukraine. Yet, you became offended when I showed you that there are also nazis in Russia. Sounds like you’re doing a disservice to the living survivors of the massacres.

            The next time you pretend not to support Russia’s massacre of the Ukrainians, spout their braindead propaganda about nazis only being in one country, and have a name like “Lenins2ndcat” maybe you should try a little harder to pretend that you’re being objective.

            • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
              85·
              1 year ago

              You only brought up nazis being in Ukraine.

              That is not what the quote says at all, it simply discusses the origin of the phrase, not about whether Ukrainians are nazis. Why is reading comprehension so hard? Support whatever you want but you should rethink normalising fascist slogans out of ignorance.

              As for my name, I’ve made it quite clear russia are not communists and that I do not support them at all many times. Get a grip.

              Are you ok with the Germans normalising Zieg Heil again?

                • Move to lemm.ee@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  85·
                  1 year ago

                  Nice straw man argument.

                  It’s not a strawman. As the two are analogs, which the previous article points out.

                  You’ve made it clear from your name that you fetishize Lenin - A man who massacred more than 8 million people. You’re sick in the head, but you’re too stupid to realize it.

  • Ignacio@kbin.social
    131·
    1 year ago

    50% is half of the territory, but looking at the maps, it looks like it’s less than 50%. Am I missing something?

  • gun@lemmy.mlEnglish
    143·
    1 year ago

    So he’s trying to argue the blue area = the red area in size. Doesn’t look exactly so.

      • gun@lemmy.mlEnglish
        44·
        1 year ago

        Blinken makes no distinction between what territory changed hands before 2022 and after. That wasn’t the claim

        Edit: Even so, the red area that is not outlined still looks bigger than the blue areas.

          • gun@lemmy.mlEnglish
            2·
            1 year ago

            “Map projections” lmao. The mercator map makes area look bigger the further north it is. So if anything, it would oversize the area that Ukraine has retaken in the north while undersizing the area that Russia has taken in the south. But within a small country, distortion from map projection will be negligible.

              • gun@lemmy.mlEnglish
                21·
                1 year ago

                I think you’re wrong actually. The map in question does not seem to use the ISW data.

                This is the point you are referring to from ISW: https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-july-23-2023

                (Aside, According to this arcticle, your 54% is not an actual hard percentage, but an estimate. From their own words, they measure the area of the map using Mercator projection, and state using a different projection would give you a different estimate. They don’t correct for projection error in their measurement, which as I pointed out earlier, biases the figure towards overestimating the recaptured territory in the north, and underestimating the area still under Russia’s control in the south. )

                But compare LiveUA map to the timelapse here. Their data shows large areas under Russian control that are not shown as recaptured on the LiveUA map. I should not have said “looks like” when it is clear from the map that the red area, minus Crimea and pre-2022 DPR and LPR, is still much larger than the blue area.

                Saying 50% has been recaptured is contingent upon how much territory Russia actually controlled in the Kharkiv and Kiev areas during the first few weeks of the war. This figure is insanely variable based on who you ask. In those first few weeks, Russian propagandists would greatly overstate how much territory in the north had been captured. In reality, Russia went into the northern area with a very small force and captured a few highways. If you paint with a very broad brush, all of the surrounding area came under Russian control, even if Russian troops never had a presence there. But that does not correspond to the strict reality.

    • Commiejones@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      Why not just say #NukeTheWorld?

      Also American jets need Pristine runways to take off. Ukraine couldn’t use F16s if they had them even if they had trained pilots.

    • TWeaK@lemm.ee
      3·
      1 year ago

      Lmfao I knew I recognised that name from somewhere…

      However your link is weird for me, had to copy the text and paste it to view. Otherwise it just comes up as https://<myinstance>/post/url. Maybe because your original federated post was deleted or something?

      Kbin is weird and janky with its federation to lemmy.

      Working link for others: https://vicharacterdaily.tumblr.com/image/160194386538