Ukraine has ossified into something like the modern version of the horrific Battle of Verdun, fought 108 years ago on the 1916 Western Front of World War I. That meat grinder cost France and Germany some 700,000 dead and wounded.
The nightmare ended 10 months later, after the heroic French defense stopped the final German push. But the respective armies ended up in the same position as when the battle started.
After the failed preemptive Russia attack on Kyiv in February 2022 and the subsequent collapsed Ukrainian six-monthlong “spring” counteroffensive of spring 2023, the Ukrainian war has now similarly deadlocked.
Russia has failed to annex Ukraine. It has not expanded much beyond occupied Crimea and Donbas.
Yet Ukraine seems unable to push back the Russians to where they started in February 2022, much less recover lost areas grabbed earlier in…
