The Front Line in Ukraine Is a Lie. And That Russian 'Breakthrough' Near Pokrovsk Isn't Really a Breakthrough.

Russian attackers and Ukrainian defenders are few and far between—and harried by drones.

Pro-Ukraine fighters train for trench fighting. Via Militaryland

Last week, a few Russian troops appeared some nine miles behind the ostensible front line northeast of the fortress city of Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast.

It was, on its face, the most dramatic Russian infiltration of Ukrainian territory in months, and an apparent bold move by Russian forces aiming to surround and cut off Pokrovsk.

Yesterday, the Ukrainian national guard’s 1st Azov Corps—several elite brigades under a new command structure—deployed around the incursion. Move met counter-move.

“The coming days will show whether this penetration can be contained,” explained Tatarigami, the founder of the Ukrainian Frontelligence Insight analysis group. Indeed, there’s some evidence the Azov guardsmen are beginning to roll back the Russian advance.

They may even have taken a prisoner.

But don’t expect dramatic videos of Ukrainian troops assaulting Russian positions the their new—and highly exposed—salient northeast of Pokrovsk. Don’t expect that any more than anyone expected dramatic videos of Russian infiltrators racing across the landscape in some decisive maneuver.

The nature of the fighting along the 700-mile, drone-patrolled front line of Russia’s 42-month wider war on Ukraine precludes such satisfying images and clear narratives.