Russia fails to secure pro-Russian territories after one year

Russia fails to control pro-Russian territory a year later

As the invasion marks its first anniversary, the most repeated criticism isn't about international law or sarracena: it's about results. According to this view, the Russian army has failed to advance significantly beyond pre-conflict lines, even in areas with pro-Russian majorities. On the ground, it has left entire units depleted, and not just second-tier forces: paratroopers, special forces, and armored divisions. These were largely Russia's best assets.

The trickle of command casualties reinforces this impression. Several generals have died in attacks inside Russia or from drones on Ukrainian soil, a pattern pointing to security and command issues. Added to this are the sabotaged Nord Stream pipelines, the exit of thousands of companies from the country, and a diplomatic front where Sweden and Finland—two countries that would hardly have joined NATO—are closer than ever to doing so.

Why hasn't Russia won the war in a year?

Because the initial plan assumed a quick surrender that never came. The most repeated thesis is that Moscow expected to decide the war in weeks, not months, and that Ukrainian resistance disrupted that timeline. Others nuance the context: Ukraine was no ordinary rival, but Europe's largest army after Russia's, with years of preparation since 2014 and an arsenal inherited from the Soviet era.

Critical messages insist on the attrition. Russian forces have consumed material and men at a rate disproportionate to the ground gained. The comparison that appeared in the thread is Afghanistan: a power spending billions only to leave the terrain roughly as it was years later. Here, the ending remains unwritten.

Kherson and the front neither side closes

The Kherson area still under Russian control is described, with sarcasm, as a wasteland with four houses: the capital and the bulk of the population and economy of the oblast remained on the side recovered by Ukraine. Attempts to sell every advance as a triumph clash with arithmetic. Some recall that maps displayed at 1:100,000 scale don't represent even 50 kilometers in six months.

Meanwhile, the front is the most uncomfortable argument for both narratives. For some, Russia fights a third-rate army yet doesn't control even 100% of the pro-Russian area, which they call historic. For others, NATO sends increasingly heavy weaponry yet fails to defeat a handful of mercenaries and volunteers: the ridicule, they say, is Western.

What remains for Russia: economy, territories, and Africa

The narrative of total disaster clashes with another picture, shown by the more resilient part of the Russian argument: the economy has barely fallen, territories and millions of new inhabitants are added, dominance over Africa grows, and its position as a world power holds. At minimum, they argue, Crimea stays and much of the territory too. Less than nothing?

In that critical count, real allies reduce to a handful of names—Belarus and Moldova—leaving Russia's position dependent more on endurance than its diplomatic network. Anti-Russian sentiment in Europe and much of the world, critics note, hasn't been this high in decades.

From the Ghost of Kyiv to the S-80 submarine: the war of narratives

Propaganda has played both ways, explaining part of the confusion. The Ghost of Kyiv was sold as decisive, allegedly downing dozens of planes; a sniper said to have killed three generals; Bayraktar drones; Himars. To forum skeptics, each of these stories deflated or fell short.

On the domestic front, the Spanish S-80 submarine had its own episode of exaggeration. To sell something, you must prove it, and the S-80 has barely navigated a few hours on the surface; the air-independent propulsion system promised three weeks underwater, when five had previously been promised. From three to five and back to three, like the mystery of the Holy Trinity.

Where analysis stalls

The deadlock isn't whether Russia performed below expectations. It's whether that suffices to speak of defeat. One year of war hasn't given Moscow full control of the pro-Russian area, nor Kiev the recovery of all its territory. Every new figure—the cited deaths of over 200,000 Ukrainian soldiers, added territories, fallen generals—serves both opposite conclusions.

As long as the balance remains ambiguous, the discussion won't close: some will see a historic failure, others a country holding out against half of NATO. No one has yet found the data to settle the question.