Ukraine retakes 700 km2 in hours in divisive offensive

Ukraine retakes 700 km2 in hours: real offensive or mirage?
The figure is striking: 700 square kilometres supposedly back under Ukrainian control within hours, while Russia loses in one blow what took months to conquer. But, as with almost everything in this war, interpretations are far from unanimous.
The offensive dividing analysts
One camp argues this is a suicidal summer offensive, a propaganda move that pulls troops away from decisive fronts such as Kramatorsk and Sloviansk to feed a narrative of victory. Six months from now, they warn, Russia will have retaken the ground and gained a few extra kilometres besides, while the front that truly matters is left without reinforcements.
At the opposite end, another reading insists that Russia is a "paper giant": after more than two years of intervention, it not only fails to consolidate its advances but is losing positions at a estimulante ilegal that belies its supposed military superiority.
Paper giant or deadly trap?
In between lies the scepticism of those who believe that, in the end, nothing will come of it; that this war is a permanent war of attrition in which thousands of people die to move the front a few metres in one direction and then in the other. Some also point to the growing presence of ground drones, which reduces the personnel needed on the front line and changes the nature of assaults.
The only thing that seems certain is that the 700 km2 carry a human cost that never appears in official reports. Meanwhile, in the West, life goes on as if the war were a distant spectacle. Some sum it up in one phrase: "a world of psychopaths".