(MICHIGAN) – Ukraine’s recent battlefield setbacks do not indicate the country is losing the war against Russia, according to a military analyst who argues that tactical losses are being mistaken for strategic defeat.
In a video published on 17th August 2026, defence journalist and former United States Army and Air Force veteran Wes O’Donnell applied the tactical, operational and strategic framework used by American military officers to assess the current state of the conflict. His conclusion is that Russia is winning only at the tactical level, which he describes as the least decisive of the three.
O’Donnell cited historical examples to support his analysis. He referenced the Battle of Cannae in 216 BCE, where Hannibal achieved a complete tactical victory but failed to force Rome’s surrender. He also pointed to Germany’s Operation Michael in 1918, which achieved operational success but contributed to strategic defeat, and the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, where American forces won virtually every engagement yet lost public support for the war.
According to the analysis, Russia has achieved tactical successes around Kharkiv, Toretsk and Pokrovsk, where Russian forces are slowly advancing. However, the operational picture shows Russian territorial gains declining sharply. Data from Ukraine’s DeepState monitoring project recorded Russian gains falling from 445 square kilometres in December 2025 to just 27 square kilometres in July 2026. The Institute for the Study of War calculated that Russian casualties per kilometre of ground taken increased more than 19 fold between June 2025 and June 2026.
O’Donnell argued that Russia has already failed strategically. The Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s February 2022 objectives included the fall of Kyiv within days, the replacement of Ukraine’s government and the collapse of its military. None of these goals were achieved. Ukraine now has a functioning government, a larger and more experienced military, and a domestic defence industry valued at roughly 50 billion US dollars annually.
The analyst acknowledged that Ukraine faces genuine difficulties, including political instability in Kyiv, a paused Patriot production licence, and restricted Starlink coverage over Russian territory. However, he stated that these problems do not constitute operational collapse.
O’Donnell identified specific indicators that would signal genuine operational failure: rapid Russian territorial acceleration, large Ukrainian formations becoming isolated, Russian mechanised forces gaining freedom of movement behind the front, and Ukraine losing its ability to restore defensive lines. He stated that none of these conditions currently exist.
The analysis concluded with O’Donnell stating that the war the Russian dictator launched has already failed, and that current fighting represents a slower and more costly struggle for limited territorial gains.
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