Russia takes Vuhledar, protecting supply line; Ukraine closes firepower gap
Russia has captured Vuhledar on the Donetsk-Zaporizhia border this week after battling for the town for 18 months.
Vuhledar sits on elevated ground near a railway line that brings in supplies from Russian-occupied Crimea. Its occupation deprives Ukrainian forces of a way to interrupt Russian supply lines.
It also gives Russia control of the adjacent H-15 highway, which may help it to “eliminate the wide Ukrainian salient in western Donetsk Oblast,” said the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank.
Ukraine pushed Russian positions back in a crescent-shaped area by as much as 7.5km (5 miles) during a counteroffensive last year. That gain may now be imperilled. Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskii ordered defences strengthened in Donetsk after the loss of Vuhledar.
“The Russian seizure of Vuhledar will not on its own radically change the operational situation in western Donetsk Oblast, however, and Russian forces will likely struggle to achieve their operational objectives,” said the ISW.Since February, when it captured Avdiivka, it has pushed 35km (22 miles) west towards Pokrovsk, but Syrskii said Ukraine’s counter-invasion of Kursk in August has put a stop to that advance 10km (6 miles) shy of Pokrovsk.
About 50km (30 miles) northeast of the Pokrovsk frontline, Russian forces have been gunning for the town of Chasiv Yar all summer but have only managed to occupy an outlying eastern section so far.
A further 40km (25 miles) northeast of Chasiv Yar, Russian forces have been trying to seize Siversk without luck.
About 100km (62 miles) north of Siversk, in Kharkiv, Russia mounted a battalion-sized assault on September 26 in the direction of Kupyansk with 50 armoured vehicles and tanks. Ukraine repelled it, damaging or destroying 40 of the vehicles.
While Ukrainian defences have largely held in the face of superior Russian firepower, Russian forces have inched forward all along the front this year, capturing more than 800 sq km (310 miles) of territory.
But these tactical victories have come at enormous cost.
Ukraine’s armed forces on Sunday said 9,290 Russian troops had been killed or wounded in the week of September 22-29, an average of more than 1,300 a day, which has been typical for most of the year. Russia also lost 101 tanks and 254 armoured fighting vehicles, Ukraine said.
Developing Ukraine’s defence industry
Ukraine said it had eroded Russia’s enormous firepower advantage this year, and suggested it was also putting pressure on Russian manpower reserves.
“To date, the ratio of the use of artillery ammunition on the battlefield has decreased compared to the winter of 2024,” Ukrainian Deputy Defence Minister Ivan Havryliuk told a telethon on Tuesday. “Then the ratio was 1 to 8. Today it is 1 to 3.”
That aligned with statements from commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskii and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last month, that Russia was firing 2.5 artillery shells to Ukraine’s one.
