"Ukraine Has Conducted An Operation That Has Never Been Seen Before In History"
- 29.12.2025, 14:08
What WSU's successes have become key in 2025.
The outgoing year became for Ukraine a time of resilience, experience and important victories gained at a high price. In an interview with Charter97.org, Ukrainian military and political observer of the group "Information Resistance" Alexander Kovalenko stated that:
- After 2022, I think it was the most difficult year since the beginning of the full-scale invasion. First of all, US President Trump, who is unfavorable to Ukraine, has had an impact, and we feel it constantly and regularly on ourselves. This is a change in our diplomacy towards the United States. Ukraine has to act in ways that are not classic diplomatic ways in order to maintain support from the United States. These are the challenges in the war zone, when the enemy accumulates manpower and fights mainly in numbers, trying to press with that. This is the increased terror against the civilian population and the rear Ukraine itself on the part of Russia, which is taking place against the background of increased production of kamikaze drones like "Shahed-136" and other means of destruction.
This is, of course, a number of certain challenges related to the internal processes of moral and psychological order, which have emerged against the background of the war, and which have been discussed and raised in Ukraine throughout this year. Corruption scandals that shook Ukraine, especially in the second half of the year, and seriously undermined confidence in the government. Although, on the other hand, the Ukrainian authorities did not hinder the development of corruption investigations and even made efforts to ensure that corrupt officials, even without court decisions and punishments to date, have already been restricted in their rights and freedoms - deprivation of citizenship, removal from leadership positions, and so on. Therefore, the year was quite difficult, we can say so.
- What were the main achievements of the AFU?
- Ukraine did not lose a single regional center. We have not lost a single oblast within its administrative boundaries. Of course, this year, alas, we have lost more territories than in 2024, but we are dealing with a much larger grouping of Russian troops. As of today, the Russian occupation troops number about 710,000 personnel. This is a colossal amount of forces and means concentrated in Ukraine by the Russians.
It should be noted that, for example, in 2024 the grouping of Russian troops was actually about 500 thousand at the beginning of the year and about 600 thousand at the end of 2024. So we are talking about the fact that the grouping has been increased by more than 100 thousand compared to the end of 2024, and the Russians used exclusively the quantitative factor to continue the war against Ukraine. This is probably by far the largest army in the European part of our continent - the Russian army concentrated for the purpose of war against one country.
It is a unique situation in the history of wars and conflicts precisely from the point of view of proportions. And in this regard, I can say that Ukraine's losses even in 2025 are not the greatest. Yes, there are some unpleasant moments, for example, the Zaporizhzhya direction, where the Russians have expanded the zone of control, the Seversk direction, but with all this the defense continues to hold, and the Russian occupation troops have not seized any regional center, not a single region completely within its borders. And the capture of territories within a year will be somewhere between 4200-4300 square kilometers - this is a very low figure for such a concentration of forces and means against such a country as Ukraine. I think this is a very important aspect.
Ukraine continues to hold its defense. But beyond that, we have achieved a number of unique results. For example, conducting an operation against Russian strategic aviation, which has never been conducted before in history. Operation Web on June 1, 2025, when a crushing blow was struck against the Russian nuclear triad. Dozens of capable aircraft from the aviation component of the Russian nuclear triad were either destroyed or damaged. This is an operation of historic proportions, and Russia was not prepared for it at all.
It is also a continuation of the expansion of capabilities to blockade the Black Sea, destroying Russia's shadow fleet. We are reaching a new level of control in the Black Sea. Our remote control forced a country that had a full-fledged fleet to reformat it into a flotilla due to losses, fleeing Sevastopol for Novorossiysk. But already Novorossiysk is not a safe place for the Russian flotilla fleet.
It's also deep strikes on the Russian Federation's rear area. We begin to pressure Russia directly in its rear, destroying oil refineries, the gas transportation system, power and heat supply facilities, military facilities, airfields, ammunition depots, military-industrial complex enterprises, and a number of other facilities. That is, we are engaged in deep strikes on the rear of Russia. The scaling of these strikes is enhanced by more systematic application of missile weapons of Ukrainian production.
So this year I can say that we have not only certain achievements in defense issues, but also serious successes in striking deep into the Russian Federation itself.
- What should Ukraine expect next year?
- I think that next year Ukraine will retain its defense strategy, we will hold positions of an exclusively defense nature. I do not see the prospect of counter-offensive operations in 2026. But I see the prospect of significant scaling of strikes on the territory of the Russian Federation, as well as the expansion of operations in the waters of the Black Sea, strikes in the Caspian Sea area against Russian facilities and the Caspian Flotilla.
In addition, operations outside Ukraine and the Black Sea area are possible, for example, in the Mediterranean Sea. We may even hear about some kind of operation in one of the oceans, conducted against Russian warships or representatives of the daily oil tanker fleet. Therefore, it is primarily a question of scaling up external operations. For Ukraine now the key is to keep the defense.
2026 is the year which should become for Ukraine the year of depletion of the Russian human resource, so that Russia could not only attack, but also effectively conduct defense operations at the expense of this resource.
I absolutely do not believe in any peace negotiations and "peace" and see no point in even raising this issue. For one simple reason - it does not correspond to reality, because Russia itself is not ready for peace and wants to continue the war. How can we talk about peace if one side wants only war?
In this regard, diplomacy is appropriate only to demonstrate that Ukraine is a democratic country, with civilized diplomacy, ready to discuss and debate. And Russia is a country that is incapable of negotiation. Ukraine's main task in 2026 is to fully convince the American side that Russia is incompetent. Therefore, total aid to Ukraine is the only way out of this impasse. Only diplomacy of force, not diplomacy of peace, can bend Russia to any peace agreement.