Below Senior Fellow Can Kasapoğlu offers a military situation report about the war in Ukraine.
Executive Summary
• Ukraine’s shrinking foothold in Kursk: Ukraine’s forces have withdrawn from Sudzha, increasing the likelihood of a complete Ukrainian retreat from Kursk. This would allow Moscow to redeploy troops to other flashpoints.
• Russian progress in Ukraine slows: Ukrainian combat formations have stabilized the front lines near Pokrovsk following the appointment of General Mykhailo Drapatyi to lead troops there.
• Kyiv’s deep-strike campaign: Ukraine used long-range Neptune missiles to strike the Tuapse oil refinery hundreds of miles inside Russia.
1. Battlefield Assessment
The Ukrainian Armed Forces have withdrawn from Sudzha, a town in the Russian region of Kursk. Thus far no open-source intelligence has indicated that Russian or North Korean units have enveloped Ukrainian formations. Still, this makes sustaining a presence in Kursk even more difficult for Ukraine.
A joint offensive by North Korean and Russian combat formations repelled Ukraine’s incursion. Evidence shows that fighters from the former Wagner private military company also played a role in the Russian offensive. As Russian and North Korean troops breached Ukraine’s lines of defense, Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the Russian military headquarters for the Kursk region. After months of downplaying the significance of Ukraine’s incursion, the Kremlin capitalized on the moment to emphasize this operation as an important success.
Beyond being a defeat in the ongoing war for the narrative, losing Kursk could have three major consequences for Ukraine. First, with ceasefire negotiations looming, the loss would deprive Ukraine of precious diplomatic leverage in a territory swap. Second, removing Ukraine from Kursk could allow the Russian military to move the tens of thousands of troops it has fielded there to other fronts. Third, the loss of Kursk increases the likelihood that the Kremlin could invade Ukraine’s neighboring Sumy Oblast.
In a positive development for Kyiv, the Ukrainian military seems to have defended and stabilized the front lines in the battle-worn town of Pokrovsk following the appointment of General Mykhailo Drapatyi to lead troops there. Nonetheless, Russian offensives in this sector have made small tactical gains.
Toretsk also remains heavily contested, with Ukrainian and Russian combat formations engaged in strenuous fighting. Ukraine faces a serious threat from Russian first-person-view drones equipped with fiber-optic cables, a threat the author witnessed firsthand on a recent Hudson Institute field tour of Ukraine. In another drone warfare development, the Ukrainian military has begun to use unmanned ground vehicles to deploy concertina wire.
In the air, Russia continues to batter Ukraine. Moscow has launched drone barrages involving over 100 Shahed loitering munitions each, often followed by ballistic missile salvos. Russia’s high rate of drone usage suggests it has boosted production capacity at its Iran-supported drone plant in Tatarstan, a finding that Ukrainian officials confirmed during the author’s field tour.
2. Ukraine’s Deep-Strike Campaign Continues to Harm Russian Oil Revenues
On March 14 the Ukrainian military successfully hit the Tuapse oil refinery in Russia’s Krasnodar region, hundreds of miles from the Russia-Ukraine border. Imagery from the impact zone indicates large fires raging in the Tuapse compound. Ukraine struck the refinery at least three times.
The incident marked another successful attack in a series of long-range Ukrainian salvos directed at Russia’s energy infrastructure, which is critical to the Russian economy. In the first few months of 2025, Kyiv disrupted at least 10 percent of Russian refining capacity with air strikes.
To hit the refinery, Ukraine used long-range Neptune missiles—the land-attack variant of the anti-ship missile that sank the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s flagship Moskva. Early in the war, the Neptune was key in deterring Russia from staging an amphibious landing to capture the Ukrainian city of Odesa. Since then Kyiv has worked to modify the projectile to enhance its deep-strike operations.
The anti-ship version of the Neptune has a range of roughly 120 miles, but sources claim the long-range version can hit targets over 600 miles away. Both versions use mobile launchers to boost battlefield survivability. The new deep-strike variant’s increased operational range and highly destructive warhead are a vital boost to Ukraine’s conventional capabilities.