Ukraine has confirmed that he is removing his troops from his positions in the Russian region of Kursk, where his soldiers entered last August in an offensive surprise. The decision occurs in the shadow of the impulse in the diplomatic front, with a high temporary fire on the table accepted by kyiv, and is a setback for Volodimir Zelenski, which has seen in recent weeks how the relationship with the largest ally of his country, the United States.
The Ukrainian General Staff has confirmed this Friday that their units “have successfully regrouped” in Kursk, “have retired to more advantageous defensive positions and are executing the tasks that have been assigned to them” within the Kursk region. The same source says, however, that “combat operations continue in the operations zone of the Kursk forces group.” According to The Guardianthe withdrawal has been carried out in stages for two weeks and, although the Ukrainian troops continue to control some remaining villages in the region, soldiers involved in the operation say that it is probably only a matter of time that the withdrawal is completed.
It is not clear at this time which land portion is still under control of Ukrainian soldiers. “The fighting is likely to continue on the outskirts of Sudzha and in the border villages for some time, while the Russians conclude the operation,” says John Helin, an analyst at Black Bird Group.
Losing its presence in Kursk can have, predictably, consequences for Ukraine in relation to morality and negotiation power, intensifying the pressure on Zelenski after a series of difficult weeks due to the US approach to Russia and weakening its position in possible peace negotiations.
kyiv hoped to keep this territory to use it as a currency in some negotiations to end the war. Zelenski had said that he planned to play Kursk’s letter in possible negotiations to “change one territory for another”, without clarifying what part of the land occupied by Russia would ask in return.
With this operation – the first time that a foreign army occupied Russian territory since World War II – Ukraine scored its greatest territorial advances in 2024 and a moral stimulus at a time of pessimism, and also allowed him to negotiate an exchange of Russian prisoners captured by Ukrainians held by Moscow. Initially, kyiv also expected the operation to stop Moscow’s offensive in eastern Ukraine, forcing her to divert troops to Kursk’s defense, but Russian advances in the eastern part did nothing more than accelerate last year.
The Russian counteroffensive
While diplomatic fluctuations monopolized the media focus, on the battlefield, Ukrainian soldiers have quickly losing ground in Kursk under the pressure of Russian troops, whose counteroffensive has been charging impulse in recent weeks. The Kremlin said Wednesday that the Russian army was “advancing successfully” and that the dynamics was “favorable” for Moscow. That same day, Vladimir Putin dressed in a military uniform to visit a command post in the region, showing what his priority was before sitting at a negotiating table.
The final setback came with the loss of Sudzha, the main population core of the Kursk region occupied by Ukraine in its incursion and located just 10 kilometers from the border between the two countries. On Tuesday, the Tass agency published images that showed soldiers with the Russian flag with which he claimed that Moscow’s troops had entered the city center. On Thursday, Russia announced that he had regained total control of the town, in which some 5,000 inhabitants lived before the Ukrainian incursion.
Kursk was the first “but” that Putin put this Thursday when he expressed his conditions at high the 30 -day fire that Donald Trump wants to accept in Ukraine. Concerned that his offensive was frustrated, the head of the Kremlin dropped that he wants Ukraine to deliver the entire Russian region and said that the truce could be “advantageous” for kyiv’s forces just when Moscow is expelling them from there.
This Friday, in an apparent allusion to the situation in Kursk, Trump has assured that “thousands” of kyiv soldiers “are completely surrounded” and that he has asked Putin to “forgive their lives.” kyiv has denied that his military is at risk of fence due to the progress of the Russian counteroffensive. “The information about the alleged ‘fence’ of Ukrainian units by the enemy in the Kursk region are false and manufactured by the Russians to politically manipulate and exert pressure on Ukraine and its partners,” said the Ukrainian General Staff on Friday in the same message in which he confirms the withdrawal of some positions. Experts have also denied that there is a large -scale Russian fence as the US president suggests.
Putin’s response has not taken long to arrive: he has assured that the Ukrainian units left in Kursk must surrender. “In case they depose weapons and give themselves, life and decent treatment will be guaranteed,” he said.
The rumors of a Ukrainian withdrawal had increased in recent days. The Russian founder of the group of military experts Conflict Intelligence Team said Wednesday that the Ukrainian units seemed to be withdrawing from Kursk’s busy zone after the entrance of Russian forces in Sudzha. Meanwhile, Ukrainska Pravda collected on Wednesday that the Ukrainian troops were retreating in Kursk, particularly in the Sudzha area, but they were not completely withdrawing from the region, but moving to positions located on the Russian side of the border.
At the same time, the Ukrainian president showed a Ukrainian replication. “Our forces in the Kursk region are fulfilling their duty. The Russians try to exert maximum pressure on our forces. The military command is doing what it can to save the lives of our soldiers, ”said Zelenski.
Logistic problems
The analysts of Think Tank American The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) confirmed last Sunday that Moscow’s troops were “crumbling the northern part of the Ukrainian outgoing in the Kursk region.” In that evaluation, the group of experts highlighted the temporary correlation between these Russian advances and the suspension of the exchange of intelligence information from the United States with Ukraine, although he acknowledged that the link was not clear – several experts have ruled out.
Ukrainian troops have told local media in recent days that the situation was increasingly critical, since logistics had been hindered. “The main problem was the interception by Russia of the few available supply routes, with a main road to Sudzha. As Kursk’s bag was compressed, it became increasingly unsustainable, ”said military analyst Michael Kofman.
“The situation on the ground speaks for itself: the interruption of large -scale Ukrainian logistics meant that some type of withdrawal was only a matter of time,” says Helin in a report. “The Russians had also been successful in the creation of local penetrations with large -scale infantry assaults. All the elements that led to collapse had already been seen before, and the lack of intelligence exchange as much exasperated the situation, as well as the withdrawal of the most important troops once the situation became critical. ” As this expert points out, it is still difficult to evaluate the Ukrainian casualties.
Moscow had been trying to expel Ukrainian forces since August of last year, after kyiv seized about 1,000 kilometers of Russian territory in his surprise incursion, but, with the help of North Korea troops, they had recovered most of that territory and its activity in the area had intensified in recent days.
Zelenski said Friday that the Kursk operation “has achieved its goal.” “The situation is very difficult at the moment. I can only thank our soldiers for this operation: he achieved his goal. First, the pressure on the Járkov front decreased, and then began to remove their troops from the east direction. I think the situation in the Pokrovsk front is now stable, and it will be very difficult for them to find an opportunity to occupy Pokrovsk again, ”he said, about one of the main Ukrainian bastions in Donetsk.
But many experts have a different vision, and believe that the offensive tested the already reduced Ukrainian forces – in fact, kyiv the operation cost him criticism. “Kursk displaced the conflict to Russian territory, and Russia used some of his best units to fight for him, but also needed a considerable number of Ukrainian elite units to maintain the position,” Kofman said to The Guardian. “It was tactically a success, but the offensive changed little the general dynamics of this war and did not achieve its broader operational objectives.”
The Sumy region, in danger?
In the heat of Moscow’s counteroffensive, Ukrainian border guards are registering attempts from small assault groups of entering the Ukrainian region of Sumy, with which Kursk limits.
In the opinion of the Black Bird Group analyst, the Ukrainians are likely to “complete their withdrawal towards more defensive positions in Sumy in the next few days and weeks.” “After that, the situation is more murky,” he adds. “The Russians can maintain their strength in this sector and try to continue the Ukrainian force by the border towards Sumy (…) This would also force the Ukrainians to maintain a considerable contingent of defenders in this sector and prevent them from transferring the retired troops as reserves to the eastern front.” However, he believes that “Russians themselves could see more value in moving their strength to support their efforts in the Donetsk region.”
The group of analysts see that the Russians try to maintain “at least some pressure on Ukrainian forces” in Sumy.
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