Swiss Daily Speculates Russia Will Liberate Donbass ‘By October,’ Forcing Ukraine to Negotiate

As Russian forces advance steadily in the military op zone, Ukraine has been racking up battlefront failures. Facing a drastic shortage of military personnel, with growing numbers of fighting-age men dying in combat, deserting, or dodging the draft, top commander Oleksandr Syrsky recently acknowledged the “difficult” situation facing Kiev’s forces.

Swiss German-language daily Blick has speculated that Russia will liberate Donbass by October.

There is a prevailing tenor that “Ukraine will lose the war, the conflict will freeze and we will have to negotiate,” the newspaper cited an assault brigade officer hunkered down near Chasov Yar as saying.

Despite the weapons and ammunition package worth $61 billion promised by the US to Ukraine, senior officers shared pessimistic forecasts with the outlet. According to them, Kiev’s looming rout by Russia’s military can be explained by several reasons.

The Pentagon is poised to supply $1 billion in new military materiel to the Kiev regime. The package includes air defense ammo, artillery rounds, armored vehicles, and other military equipment.

Firstly, Ukraine’s military faces an acute shortage of manpower. Ukrainian brigades fighting on the nearly 1,500-kilometer-long combat line of NATO's proxy conflict are operating at 30-40% personnel strength in many places, as per the report.

“The current mobilization will not save us. Those enlisted and training now will not be with us until October at the earliest. By then we will have lost all of Donetsk,” another Ukrainian officer admitted to the publication.

Ukraine has lost almost half a million soldiers since the beginning of the special military operation in 2022, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said earlier in April. More than 71,000 soldiers and over 11,000 units of various weapons of the Kiev regime have been wiped out since the start of the year, according to Shoigu. Per the defense minister, Russian servicemen have "dispelled the myth about the superiority of Western weapons."

Servicemen hold flags in Donetsk People's Republic.

© Sputnik / Sergey Averin

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In addition to a new mobilization law coming into force in Ukraine from mid-May, Poland and Lithuania have announced that they will extradite conscript-aged Ukrainian men to the country for military service. But this will not be enough, another of the neo-Nazi regime’s fighters acknowledged.

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A shortage of ammunition on the front has left Ukrainian troops with little means to counter advances by the Russian military. “We can hold back the Russians... but not defeat them,” another Ukrainian officer said.

Furthermore, the appointment of Oleksandr Syrsky, who is known by the gruesome nickname "The Butcher," as head of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in February has reportedly bred “tensions” on the front. Officers have complained that brigades have been sent on missions with virtually no ammunition and far too few men.

Three brigades seemingly scared of Russia's advancing forces that refused to comply with the Ukrainian command's orders were reportedly disbanded. Near Avdeyevka, chaos and lack of equipment led fighters from the 115th Brigade to abandon their position, the report revealed.

Adding to the “Ukraine fatigue” in the West, there is now a new problem for Zelensky and his clique – battle weariness on the Ukrainian eastern front. And the US $61 billion will not be enough to stamp it out, the outlet summed up.

The Ukrainian military is currently in dire straits despite all the billions' worth of Western aid funneled to Kiev. Not only are the armed forces suffering a shortage of personnel, but combat fatigue is fueling a breakdown in discipline. Multiple reports in recent weeks have revealed that Ukrainian troops have been refusing to take orders from the country’s new commander-in-chief, Oleksandr Syrsky. As for recruitment, draft dodging in the country has soared to new heights of ingenuity. Syrsky begrudgingly acknowledged earlier in April that his forces were backing down amid the “difficult” situation at the front.