Ukraine may well capitulate by the end of the summer. From Ian DeMartino at sputnikglobe.com:
With Russia liberating village after village and Ukraine seemingly unable to secure a defensive line ahead of the onslaught, former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter predicts that the conflict will end this summer, in line with the timeline established by the Russian Ministry of Defense at the start of this year.
On Friday, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that Russia liberated Novokalinovo in the Donetsk People’s Republic and Kiselevka and Kotlyarovka in the Kharkov region, the latest in a string of villages to fall, this rapid deterioration of the frontline was the result of the consistent work of Russian forces to grind the Ukrainians down until they had no reserves to stabilize the front line.
“As we speak, the attritional warfare model has Ukraine losing around 1,500 troops a day. This number is going up now because Russia’s expanded its operations into the Kharkov region. So, you can expect this number [to] easily top 2,000 a day,” Ritter told Sputnik’s Fault Lines on Friday.
