Russian Forces Push Deeper Into Northern Ukraine

Part of the Russians’ plan with this overall attack, military analysts said, is to threaten Kharkiv and force Ukraine to divert troops from other battlefields, especially those in the eastern Donbas region.

And that’s exactly what is happening. A group of Ukrainian special forces soldiers were huddling at a gas station on Sunday afternoon, swigging energy drinks and trying to get the lay of the land. They looked tired. And they said they had just been redeployed from Donbas.

“The Russians have understood, just as a lot of analysts have, that the major disadvantage that Ukraine is currently suffering from is manpower,” said Franz-Stefan Gady, a Vienna-based military analyst. “By thinning out the front line, you are increasing the odds of a breakthrough.”

There may be an even bigger, more strategic motive. President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia is fresh off an election victory that he billed as a referendum on launching this war. For his troops to threaten Kharkiv, again, and send miles of cars full of terrified civilians fleeing down the highways, again, and turn Ukraine’s second largest city into a shell of itself, again, could demoralize Ukrainians and its allies.

Read the full story and more from The New York Times.