Media coverage has grown gloomier in recent weeks on the back of fragmentary journalistic accounts from the front and reported intelligence assessments from Western analysts.

Defenders can hold for a long time and then suddenly break, allowing an attacker to make rapid gains before the defense solidifies further to the rear.

Russian forces have prepared extensive defenses in depth, consisting of wide, deep belts of skillfully laid mines, antitank ditches and other obstacles.

More broadly, the Russian army has adopted an elastic defense, in which its troops initially fall back and then counterattack once the Ukrainian forces take losses and begin to tire.

They are also attriting assets in Russian-occupied territory, taking out artillery units, headquarters and reserve force staging areas, as well as targeting key supply depots and routes to make it more difficult for Russia to sustain its defense.

It is also unclear how heavily mined or manned Russia’s secondary defensive lines are, but there is good reason to doubt that the Russians have large numbers of high-quality soldiers holding them.

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