What's happening on the frontline in Ukraine? | War briefing with Professor Michael Clarke

Everybody concentrates on the Iran war, but there's some pretty important things happening in the Ukraine war as well, which we shouldn't lose sight of.Last night, there were a series of big Russian air attacks on the big cities, Kiev, Kharkiv, Poltava, Dnipro, Zaporizhia.More than 600 drones, more than 70 -odd missiles, which did a fair bit of damage.And this is obviously the beginning of a Russian air campaign, day and night, to attack the civilian population centres of Ukraine in order to break the spirit of the population.But underneath that, other things are happening which are not so surprising.favourable to the Russians.

And Sky's data and forensics team, working as well with the Institute for War Reporting, has uncovered a whole series of attacks on the logistics supply routes that the Russians are using.This route in particular, from Russia itself into Crimea, constantly attacked by the Ukrainians to prevent the logistics moving backwards and forwards to Crimea.And this route to the north.These are logistics routes that serve the frontline areas, fighting in Pokrovsk and Kostyantynivka and Shazivyar and so on.Attacking these routes is very important because, in effect, what the forensics team have discovered is that the attacks themselves have prevented a lot of the frontline material getting to the front lines themselves.And Russian troops are coming under real pressure because of the attacks in the rear areas of their supply lines.

More attacks on Telegram show the targeting of the motorway and vehicles along the Mariupol -Tannenrog and Mariupol -Vornavka routes that we looked at.Even more interesting are Ukrainian attacks on the air defence systems in the front line itself.And again, two areas of concentration.One is here, and these are the air defence systems that serve that front line that we were talking about.The reason I think that the Ukrainians are attacking this so obviously is because they're trying to push the Russian Air Force back because the Russian Air Force is launching glide bombs, and these glide bombs have played havoc with the front lines of the Ukrainians for the last couple of years.If they can push the Russian Air Force back,

then the glide bombs have to be released from much further away.They do far less damage.And again, the same for Crimea.Crimea itself is a really important strategic gain for the Russians, which they took.They absorbed it in 2014.If the air defence systems can be destroyed in Crimea, then Crimea is potentially wide open to further Ukrainian attacks.

They would love to make Crimea vulnerable for Putin because that would be a big strategic advantage for him.More than that, the Russians are finding that they are having trouble recruiting people.This is a recruiting poster in English, which is around now.It's fairly obvious what it is.They're looking for UAV operators, drone operators, to serve in the 18th Combined Arms Army.They're offering lots of money when a contract is completed.

But look at this.220 ,000 rubles a month in pay.That's about 2 ,000 pounds, which is twice the average wage.It's more than three or four times the average wage in the poorer oblasts of eastern Russia, in Siberia, and so on.And it's not just the money.There's a whole series of advantages, becoming a citizen, having veteran status, having free child care, free medical treatment and rehabilitation, lots and lots of different advantages if you sign up as a soldier.

Even so.The Russians are recruiting fewer than 1 ,000 men a day and they're losing rather more than 1 ,000 men a day killed and badly injured every day, 1 ,200, 1 ,300 on a daily basis.So they're running out of troops, frontline troops that they can send to the front which are starved of logistics.It's become very difficult for them.And so back to the air attacks overnight.Of course, the Russians have got the facility to make the lives of ordinary Ukrainians miserable.

But the fact is, they're not doing very well on the battlefield.They're losing more men and they're losing more territory than they are gaining.And the Ukrainians have done surprisingly well over the years.and early spring period.The pendulum, I would say, is not swinging back towards Ukraine completely, but the Russian swing of the pendulum seems to have stopped, and we'll see which way the ultimate pendulum goes, the advantages and disadvantages of war, in the summer months to come.