Recent Western injections of billions of dollars’ worth of military equipment some of it high-tech and top-of-the-line to Ukraine has raised expectations about when it would be used, and to what effect against dug-in Russian lines. For months, Ukrainian commanders in the eastern city of Bakhmut which was largely devastated in a months-long fight that has been one of the bloodiest battles of the war have used the language of counteroffensive and defensive operations to describe the activity there. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said that counteroffensive and defensive actions are underway against Russian forces, asserting that his top commanders are in a “positive” mindset as their troops engaged in intense fighting along the front line. Do you think that the counteroffensive has already started and it is going terribly wrong ?

