For the first time, after four years of fighting, Ukrainians on the front lines have the feeling that things are beginning to change on the front, CNN reports, citing the testimonies of soldiers.
Ukraine took the initiative in the war photo shutterstock
“We see and feel a change in attitude among the Russians at the front. They are exhausted,” Kirilo Bondarenko, an officer with the Lazar Group, which is fighting in the Zaporizhia area, told CNN.
“We managed to recover and turn the situation around,” he says of the developments of recent months, which have also begun to be felt on the front. It's not just a feeling. The latest successes outline a new reality.
Last month, Ukraine achieved a remarkable feat, given the course of the war so far, in which Russia seemed to be continually conquering territory: for the first time, it liberated more territory than Russia conquered. It is the first net loss of territory for the invading army since August 2024, when the Ukrainian army launched its bold incursion into the Kursk region.
This success is not due to the size of the liberated territory – moreover, Russia still occupies and controls about 20% of the territory of Ukraine – but to the fact that the Ukrainian army seems to have regained the initiative.
This turn is a problem for Russia and for Vladimir Putin who has so far built his war narrative around the idea that his victory is “inevitable”: sooner or later, the Russian army will succeed in occupying and militarily claiming the entire Donbas region.
Moscow's negotiating tactics were also based on the same narrative of a slow but sure advance.
“The whole premise of Putin's negotiating tactic is to appeal to this cognitive warfare to convince the West that there is no point in supporting Ukraine and that they should simply convince Ukraine to give in to all of Russia's demands now,” explained Christina Harward of the Institute for the Study of War (ISW).
Or, what happens “actually dismantles the whole narrative”.
Record figures for the Ukrainian army
The past few months have been a “record” for Ukraine's successes along the front line, Ukrainian Defense Minister Mihailo Fedorov said on Tuesday.
According to him, in the months of March and April, 35,000 Russians were eliminated on the front so that Russia “does not have enough forces to continue offensive operations. The Ukrainian army is exhausting the Russians”, he emphasized.
This streak of success is no accident and can be attributed in large part to drone superiority. Now the war with drones is total, being waged on three fronts: on the battlefield – through short-range attacks on Russian positions on the front line; deep in Russia – by long-range strikes on the oil infrastructure that finances the war; respectively, more recently, through medium-range strikes targeting Russian logistics.
“We've seen a really dramatic increase in the number of these strikes being carried out by the Ukrainians. It's affecting Russia's logistics. If it is now constantly threatened by Ukrainian drone strikes, this will threaten, slow down and significantly hamper its logistics,” the ISW analyst pointed out.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy made the same observation recently: medium-range strikes on Russian military logistics — from warehouses and command posts to air defense systems — are Kiev's top priority, which is why Ukraine is ramping up contracts and production.
Confirmation also came from the front.
In this regard, a high-ranking officer of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), with the code name Bankir, told CNN that, despite Russia's attacks in the direction of Zaporizhia, Ukraine managed to partially regain control over some areas conquered by Russia a few months ago.
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“Many different units are deployed in our sector. This part of the front is maintained thanks to the coordinated efforts of all defense forces – from infantry holding positions to drones constantly operating and striking the enemy,” he explained.
A front saturated with drones
There are so many drones on the front line that soldiers can barely move – a reality that hurts both sides, but a problem that affects more seriously Russian troops, who can no longer sustain the rate of attrition.
This is why Russian infantry, in small groups, are trying to infiltrate areas under Ukrainian control and thus create the illusion of constant progress.
They eventually manage to raise the Russian flag in the so-called gray no man's zone that defines the current front line, but they cannot hold the position for long.
“The Russians are constantly reporting to the commanders that they have captured various villages, but in reality they are not there. We are constantly pushing them out of there. Our medium-range strikes, which we conduct continuously, help us a lot in this regard,” said Bondarenko.
A rollercoaster
Ukraine has also achieved important successes behind the front lines by stepping up strikes on Russian soil, targeting oil and gas infrastructure to prevent it from taking advantage of rising oil prices amid the Iran war.
At the same time, these deep strikes brought the war much closer to ordinary Russians. But Russian attacks on Ukrainian cities have also become rampant, causing civilian casualties.
Dmitro, a drone operator in Ukraine's 79th Brigade, revealed to CNN that the day-to-day reality on the front is “an emotional rollercoaster.”
While every tactical success boosts troop morale, soldiers on the front lines are constantly worried about their loved ones back home amid daily attacks on populated areas and vital civilian infrastructure.
Last year was declared the deadliest for Ukrainian civilians since 2022: 2,500 dead, according to the United Nations.
But in the first months of the year there were even more deaths – with each month the number increasing. But now the war is felt hard by the Russians as well, not just by the Ukrainians.
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“When we hit Russian cities, with their buildings and factories, the people of Russia recognize that there is war,” says Dmitri. “And later in the same day, we get hit horribly in multiple places with multiple casualties. It's just endless chaos.”
Beyond the tactical victories that the Ukrainians have managed to achieve in recent months, Russia has put sticks in its own wheels, for example, after they lost access to the Starlink satellite network, also disabling Telegram, the encrypted messaging application widely used by frontline soldiers for military communications.
Domestically, the war is becoming problematic and unpopular. Economic problems deepen, Russians unhappy with internet outages, while Ukrainian attacks cause concern. At the same time, the human cost is increasing. Recently, Russian opposition publications Mediazona and Meduza published new estimates of Russian losses: as many as 352,000 Russians have been killed since the full-scale invasion was launched.
Neither camp publishes official figures, but estimates in the case of Ukraine are between 100,000 and 150,000 dead.
All in all, there are good signs for Ukraine. But it is still war, and the spring season with its blooming vegetation could reduce visibility for Ukrainian drone operators and provide more cover for Russian infiltrators.
Ukraine has also carried out large-scale counter-offensives – they were spectacular, but did not bring a victory. In any case, if they don't win decisively, at least they don't lose as much as Russia.
