There have been a number of important battles in Ukraine, Michael Clarke says.
He lists the likes of Bakhmut earlier in the war and Pokrovsk more recently.
Russian strategic win?
For Moscow, a big win would be to take a “big city like Kharkiv or Sumy”, Clarke says.
“That would be a strategic breakthrough for the Russians if they did that,” he tells us.
So while it would be important to take some of the tactically valuable settlements near the frontline, Clarke says a big city falling to Russia would really matter.
Ukraine’s two ‘game-changers’
Clarke lists two things that could massively help Kyiv.
The first would be getting “within artillery range of Crimea.”
This would help bring the fight right to Russia and the 800,000 Russians who moved into Crimea since 2014.
Since around 2022, Crimea has acted as a staging post for Putin’s forces.
“But if the Ukrainians could make Crimea unviable, it wouldn’t have to invade it. If they were close enough to make it unviable for the Russian residents as well as Russian military, that’ll be big, that would be a strategic game-changer,” Clarke says.
This might be such a blow for Russia that Putin might consider a ceasefire, Clarke says.
The other thing Ukraine could do is cut off the land bridge between the Donbas and the southeast of Ukraine.
“If they could cut that land bridge and really separate Russian forces either side of it, that too would be a big strategic game changer,” Clarke adds.