Of Michael Drummondforeign news reporter

Ukraine’s frontline risks “collapsing” as Russian forces capture village after village, analysts have warned.

The defenders of Kiev, exhausted by nearly three years of fighting, are outnumbered and in desperate need of equipment.

Furthermore, their daring foray into Russia’s Kursk region over the summer means that some of their most elite troops are now stuck across the border and unable to help shore up vulnerable spots along the front line.

Russia’s defense minister said Moscow’s forces were “accelerating” their advance in eastern Ukraine.

In August, Ukrainian forces launched a daring incursion across the Russian border, backed by tanks and other armored vehicles.

It seemed to catch the Kremlin by surprise and part of the Kursk region fell under Ukrainian control – and has been ever since. Some of the best trained and equipped units in Ukraine help defend the Kursk salient.

The idea was that losing territory at Kursk would be so politically unacceptable to Putin that Russia would redeploy its most capable units to eastern Ukraine to try to liberate it, thereby reducing pressure on the Ukrainian front, he says Dr. Marina Miron, expert. in War Studies from King’s College London.

But instead, Russia seems willing to keep Ukraine locked in Kursk while staging punitive strikes along the front line in Ukraine – with success.

Moscow’s forces have advanced in the past two months at their fastest pace since March 2022, according to open source data, covering village after village.

“The risk is that the front line along the Donbass will collapse,” says Dr. Myron. “Much faster, probably, because of this Kursk operation.”

She said Ukraine should worry less about what’s happening in Kursk and more about Russian advances toward the town of Toretsk and the key town of Pokrovsk – both of which are just west of Avdiivka.

“These are very important logistics centers and defense outposts for the Ukrainian armed forces, and their loss will give Russia the advantage to move forward in cities like Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.”

Pokrovsk, the sole source of coking coal for Ukraine’s steel industry, has been a major target for Putin’s military. Some reports say Russian troops are now holding positions less than six miles from the city.

And despite the fact that the US has finally lifted restrictions on Ukraine, using Western missiles to strike targets inside Russia, forces in Kiev face big problems.

British Defense Secretary John Healey warned on Thursday that the frontline in Ukraine was “less stable now than at any time since the early days of the full-scale Russian invasion”.