NARRATIVE: Pokrovsk, Huliaipillia, Kostiantynivka — three names that sum up the hell of the Donbas

NARRATIVE: Pokrovsk, Huliaipillia, Kostiantynivka — three names that sum up the hell of the Donbas

Introduction: The front that never sleeps

257 combat engagements in a single day

On June 25, 2026, Ukraine's General Staff recorded 257 combat engagements in a single day across the entire front. Two hundred and fifty-seven. That raw number, published in the June 26 report, does not capture the screaming, the smoke from shells, the drones thundering at low altitude, or the soldiers holding positions just tens of meters from the enemy. What it does capture is the industrial rhythm of a war of attrition where Russia spends human lives the way others spend fuel.

Three sectors concentrate the bulk of this violence: Pokrovsk, Huliaipillia, and Kostiantynivka. Three names that have reappeared in every Ukrainian war bulletin for months, like a mournful refrain. Three names that together trace the map of a Russian offensive gnawing slowly but relentlessly at the last shield before the major eastern cities. Understanding what is happening on these three axes means understanding why this war is far from over.

The geography of survival

The Donbas is not just a territory. It is a strategic logic. Pokrovsk is a central road and logistics hub: its fall would open a highway toward Dnipro. Huliaipillia, in Zaporizhzhia oblast, protects the southern corridor. Kostiantynivka is one of the fortress cities of the Fortress Belt — the fortified line running from Sloviansk to Kramatorsk through to Druzhkivka — and its loss would directly threaten the last major free Ukrainian population centers in Donetsk.

This is the geographic and strategic context that Russia decided to exploit this summer of 2026. After months of centimeter-by-centimeter advances, Moscow is trying to tip the balance of power across multiple sectors simultaneously, hoping that accumulated pressure will eventually crack Ukrainian defenses on at least one axis. Ukraine's Defense Forces are holding. But at what cost.

Pokrovsk: 31 assaults in 24 hours, and it starts again

The encirclement tactic

In the Pokrovsk sector, Russian troops launched 31 assault actions on June 25, 2026 alone. Ukrainian defenders held in the areas of Novooleksandrivka, Rodynske, Vasylivka, Hryshyne, Kotlyne, Udachne, and Molodetske, as well as along the axes toward Toretske, Kucheriv Yar, Ivanivka, Novyi Donbas, and Bilytske. The list of place names rings like an inventory of hell: each name hides a trench, a gutted building, a decimated unit.

Russia's tactic at Pokrovsk is now well established: progressive infiltration into the urban fabric, isolation of sectors, encirclement of small groups of defenders. It is the same scenario that led to the fall of Myrnohrad six months earlier. The Russians try to cut the city into isolated pockets, depriving Ukrainian infantry of any coherent defensive line. Every breakthrough of a few dozen meters is immediately exploited to threaten the flanks.

Ukrainian deep operational strikes

Facing this pressure, Ukraine does not limit itself to defense. The Defense Forces are conducting deep operational strikes in the directions of Pokrovsk, Kostiantynivka, and Sloviansk, targeting logistical depots, command posts, and Russian troop concentrations behind the front. These strikes aim to break the Russian supply chain before assault units even reach the contact lines.

A Ukrainian MiG-29 dropped guided bombs on a Russian frontline position in late June 2026, destroying two trenches with surgical precision. These videos, verified and published by Militarnyi, illustrate the growing technical capability of the Ukrainian military, which is transforming its aging fighters into precision strike platforms through the integration of NATO-supplied guided munitions.

Huliaipillia: 27 attacks on the southern flank

An underreported but crucial sector

The Huliaipillia sector — also written Huliaipolsk — sustained 27 Russian attacks on June 25, 2026, making this front one of the most active after Pokrovsk. Fighting concentrates around Dobropillia, in the directions of Vozdvizhivka, Hirke, Rizdvyanka, Rivne, Staroukrainka, and Charivne. This sector, in Zaporizhzhia oblast, receives less media coverage than Pokrovsk or Kostiantynivka, but its strategic value is immense.

Controlling Huliaipillia and its surrounding area means threatening the southern corridor linking the Donbas to the Sea of Azov. A Russian breakthrough in this sector would allow Moscow to further compress Ukrainian territory, creating a threat against the communication lines between the various sectors of the southern front. The Ukrainian army knows this and has reinforced its positions accordingly, despite troop rotations under constant pressure.

The drone war in Zaporizhzhia oblast

In this sector, as elsewhere, FPV drones have become the dominant weapon. Russia uses Iranian Shahed drones to saturate Ukrainian air defense systems, while combat drone swarms target frontline positions. On June 26, 2026, the Russian military attacked Ukraine with 129 UAVs in a single night, of which 113 were destroyed or jammed. The remaining 16 hit seven localities.

These figures illustrate the intensity of the logistical challenge facing Ukraine in this sector. Every drone destroyed costs materials, energy, and time for air defense teams already exhausted. Romania, a NATO neighbor, had to scramble a helicopter at 4 a.m. on June 26 to track aerial targets after a wave of Russian attacks in southern Ukraine, near its river border — a sign that the war is symbolically spilling beyond Ukrainian borders.

Kostiantynivka: the fortress that is falling

Eight months of siege, and the city is crumbling

The case of Kostiantynivka is the one that demands the most clarity, because it illustrates the tension between the official narrative and the reality on the ground. On June 22, 2026, Euromaidan Press revealed that Ukrainian generals and soldiers were offering two radically different versions of the situation in the city. Officially: "the situation is difficult but under control." On the ground: "the city is already being treated as lost."

Kostiantynivka had a pre-war population of 67,000 residents. Russian forces of the Centre Group of Forces have been besieging the city since autumn 2025. In June 2025, a group of around 50 Russian soldiers had for the first time infiltrated the city perimeter. In December 2025, Ukrainian special forces had managed to repel them. But by June 2026, it is no longer 50 but more than 100 Russian soldiers who are inside the city itself, according to an admission from the 19th Army Corps command.

The Chervone district and the irreversible scenario

When the Russians entrenched themselves in the Chervone district, in the south of Kostiantynivka, the city's tactical fate was sealed. The Kyiv Independent analyzed on June 23, 2026 that this scenario exactly reproduces the infiltration method used at Pokrovsk: penetrate the urban fabric, establish a foothold, then divide the city into isolated sectors to make any coherent defense impossible. Geolocated images circulating online show a growing Russian presence in the city center.

The ISW (Institute for the Study of War) estimated that Russia has concentrated approximately 11,000 troops in the Kostiantynivka-Druzhkivka tactical zone. These forces overwhelmingly outnumber the defenders, who began withdrawing from certain positions in early June to avoid encirclement. Analyst Clément Molin had written in mid-June: "We are approaching the end of the battle for the city, whose fall could be delayed until mid-summer."

The Fortress Belt and the ultimate stakes

Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkivka: what remains to defend

The Fortress Belt — the Donbas fortified line — is the last barrier between Russian forces and the major free Ukrainian eastern cities. It stretches over 50 kilometers, from Sloviansk to Kramatorsk through to Druzhkivka and Kostiantynivka, fortified since 2014. Since the 2022 invasion, these positions have been reinforced in depth, with bunkers, trench networks, and advanced surveillance systems.

For Russia, breaking through the Fortress Belt represents a major strategic objective. The ISW concluded on June 10, 2026 that Russian forces "remain unlikely to capture the Fortress Belt" in 2026, "although they will likely make costly tactical gains." But DeepState, the Ukrainian military analyst group, estimated that it would take Russia "approximately two years" to seize all of Donetsk oblast — with "colossal" losses at every stage.

What the fall of Kostiantynivka would really mean

Kostiantynivka's value does not lie in its ruined industries. It lies in what it protects. For months after the fall of Pokrovsk and Myrnohrad, Kostiantynivka complicated Russian efforts to march on Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, the last major free cities in Donetsk. Its loss would open a breach in the Fortress Belt, allowing the Russians to focus on those two remaining prizes.

A NATO official had told reporters in February 2026 that the alliance "does not expect a collapse of the Donbas front in the next 18 months." But that optimism was conditional — it assumed Kostiantynivka would hold. With the city now slipping into Russian hands, that calculation must be revised. Ukraine's eastern front is entering a critical phase that Western chancelleries can no longer afford to ignore.

Russian losses: an empire of cannon fodder

1,310 soldiers in a single day

As of June 26, 2026, total Russian military losses since February 24, 2022 are estimated at 1,398,370 personnel — killed and wounded. On June 25 alone, Russia lost 1,310 soldiers. At that rate, it is the equivalent of an entire division liquidated every week. 68 artillery systems were also destroyed in a single day, along with 1,778 drones.

These figures, published by Ukrainska Pravda on June 26, 2026, are not merely military statistics. They raise a fundamental moral question: how long can Russia afford to bleed at this rate? The raw answer is: for a very long time, provided Putin maintains political control and the human resources of Russia's peripheral regions — Siberia, the Far East, the Caucasus republics — continue to feed the assault units.

Missiles, guided bombs, and Shaheds

In a single day around June 25, 2026, Russia fired 1 missile (3 missiles in the overall strike), conducted 101 airstrikes with 310 guided bombs, sent 9,388 Shahed drones, and carried out 2,896 artillery strikes. These cumulative figures for a single 24-hour period illustrate the scale of the Russian war effort — and the corresponding burden on Ukrainian air defense systems.

Ukraine destroys hundreds of these vectors every day, but the cost in defensive munitions is astronomical. Every interceptor, every air defense module engaged against a Shahed costing $50,000 sometimes costs ten to twenty times more to neutralize. That is the asymmetric economic equation at the heart of Russian strategy: saturate, exhaust, wear down. Ukraine holds thanks to Western aid and its operational ingenuity — but the margin is shrinking.

Zelensky, Azov, and the politics of courage

The president on the front line

On June 26, 2026, President Volodymyr Zelensky visited Azov units and airborne troops fighting near Pokrovsk. This is not a trivial symbolic act: going to the front at the moment when Russian pressure is at its maximum across multiple sectors simultaneously is a political message as much as an act of command. Zelensky tells his soldiers they have not been abandoned, that their leader shares — at least symbolically — the risk they take every minute.

That same day, Ukraine repatriated 160 prisoners of war in a major exchange with Russia. "We remember each one in captivity," said Zelensky. These exchanges, which have become regular, are both humanitarian acts and morale tools: they show soldiers on the front line that the state will not abandon them if they are captured.

The Skelia regiment and questions about methods

But not everything in the reality of Ukrainian warfare is heroic. On June 24, 2026, the Kyiv Independent reported that an investigation had been opened into the Skelia assault regiment following a report citing 26 non-combat deaths and allegations of mistreatment. In April, footage of a failed mechanized assault near Pokrovsk had fueled criticism of the regiment's tactics.

These revelations matter for their honesty: the Ukrainian army is not a perfect army, and in a war of this intensity, abuses exist. Acknowledging that does not diminish the overall courage of Ukrainian forces — but it shows a society that, even in wartime, retains a culture of accountability and independent journalism. That is precisely what distinguishes Ukraine from Russia, where war crimes are state policy.

DeepState vs. General Staff: two readings of the same ground

The war of maps and numbers

One of the distinctive features of this conflict is the relative transparency of its geospatial data. Groups like DeepState and institutes like the ISW publish daily front assessments, often at odds with official Ukrainian communiqués. On June 22, 2026, Euromaidan Press noted that Russia had posted a net loss of -57 square miles over 4 weeks according to the ISW, while DeepState recorded a Russian gain of +10 square miles for the same period. These divergences reflect different methodologies, not necessarily disinformation.

What both sources agree on is that the Russian advance in Kostiantynivka is measured in tens of meters per day, but it is real. And that DeepState's scenario — two years to control all of Donetsk oblast with colossal losses — assumes Ukraine continues to receive adequate military aid. Without that aid, the timeline contracts dramatically.

Lyman, Kupyansk, Kharkiv: other fronts under pressure

If Pokrovsk, Huliaipillia, and Kostiantynivka command attention, other sectors are also under pressure. On the Lyman front, Russian forces are trying to infiltrate the eastern outskirts of the city and maintain strong activity in the Serebrianka forest. On the Kupyansk front, small infantry group attacks are advancing in Kharkiv oblast, near the village of Vovchanski Khutory.

In Kharkiv itself, Ukrainian border guards repel near-daily assaults without yielding ground. These multiple simultaneous pressure points are part of Russian strategy: force Ukraine to disperse its reserves and munitions across a front hundreds of kilometers long, in order to reach the breaking point on one axis or another. The Ukrainian response is a precise management of limited resources — a logistical achievement that deserves recognition.

Strikes on Crimea: 360-degree pressure

Zelensky's 40-day operation

Alongside the ground fighting in the Donbas, Ukraine is conducting a strategic strike campaign in occupied Crimea. As part of the "40-day operation" announced by Zelensky, Ukrainian forces struck the Russian cable-laying ships Volga and Vyatka (both Project 15310 type vessels), causing "a massive fire on board." These strikes, conducted by the Security Service of Ukraine, target Russian military and logistical infrastructure on the peninsula.

Meanwhile, Russian-installed authorities in Crimea declared a state of emergency on June 26, 2026 in response to the intensification of Ukrainian drone attacks, which struck a railway bridge on the North Crimea Canal, oil facilities, and military infrastructure. This deep strike campaign follows a clear strategic logic: reduce Russia's ability to supply its troops in the south and maintain constant pressure on enemy rear areas.

Romania and NATO nervousness

On June 26, 2026, Romania scrambled a military helicopter at around 4 a.m. to track aerial targets after a wave of Russian attacks on southern Ukraine, near the river border. This is not the first time that Russian drones — or their debris — have dangerously approached the territory of a NATO member state. This Romanian unease illustrates the reality of a war that is spilling beyond its official borders and placing the Atlantic Alliance in a position of permanent vigilance.

For Moscow, every incident near a NATO border is a test: how far can one go before the Alliance reacts? So far, the answer has been to watch, monitor, document — but not intervene directly. This restraint is understandable from a nuclear standpoint, but it also sends a signal to Putin: red lines have elasticity. And he knows it.

The Ukrainian economy under bombs

The worst contraction since the start of the recovery

War is not won on battlefields alone. It is also won in factories, ports, and power grids. On June 24, 2026, Euromaidan Press reported that the Ukrainian economy had just recorded its worst contraction since the start of its post-invasion recovery — directly caused by the intensification of Russian strikes on energy and industrial infrastructure. Missiles and guided bombs do not only target military positions: they target power plants, transformers, and distribution networks.

This economic attrition strategy is deliberate. Russia seeks to destroy Ukraine's industrial and energy base to reduce its ability to finance the war and maintain civilian morale. Fuel stations in Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv oblast were struck on the night of June 25–26. Every liter of fuel burned is one less unit of logistical capacity for Ukrainian forces.

Western aid dependence and its limits

In this context, Western aid is not only a question of missiles and tanks: it is also a question of generators, electrical cables, and reconstruction materials. The United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and allies have provided billions in military and civilian aid, but delivery delays, use restrictions, and political constraints often complicate getting aid where it is most needed.

The equation is brutal: Ukraine must simultaneously hold a 1,100-kilometer contact front, rebuild its infrastructure under bombs, maintain a functioning economy, and preserve a democratic society. That all of this is still holding, four years after the invasion, is objectively remarkable. But the human and economic cost is staggering, and the margins are shrinking as the war drags on.

The 160 repatriated prisoners: humanity amid barbarity

Each exchange, a partial victory

On June 26, 2026, 160 Ukrainian prisoners of war were repatriated in a major exchange with Russia. "We remember each one in captivity," Zelensky repeated, confirming that all those freed in this exchange had been held since 2022. Some had therefore spent more than four years in Russian captivity.

Detention conditions in Russian prisons are documented by organizations like the Red Cross and UN investigation teams: malnutrition, physical violence, isolation, psychological pressure. Every released prisoner carries invisible scars that will take years to heal. These exchanges, partial victories as they are, must not obscure the scale of the problem: Ukraine estimates that thousands of its soldiers are still held in Russia under inhuman conditions.

The Day of the Crimean Tatar Flag

That same June 26, Zelensky spoke on the occasion of the Day of the Crimean Tatar Flag: "We remember that justice for Ukraine means justice for the Crimean Tatar people as well." This speech is not merely a symbolic gesture: it affirms that the reconquest of Crimea, illegally annexed in 2014, remains a Ukrainian war objective. Crimea is "at the heart of Ukraine's struggle for justice," in the president's own words.

The Crimean Tatars, the peninsula's indigenous people, have suffered systematic repression since the Russian annexation: arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, religious prohibitions. The Tatar cause and the Ukrainian cause are intimately linked — both are victims of Russian imperialism. Recognizing this broadens the moral perspective of this war beyond mere territorial conflict.

The negotiation dynamic in this military context

Why front-line pressure dictates peace conditions

All the military dynamics on the three analyzed sectors — Pokrovsk, Huliaipillia, Kostiantynivka — have direct implications for any eventual peace negotiations. Russia had demanded, during June 2026 peace talks, recognition of its control over all four oblasts it claims to have annexed, including Donetsk. Euromaidan Press reported on June 22 that DeepState estimated it would take Moscow two years of fighting at colossal losses to reach that line — if Ukraine continues to receive support.

This ground reality is a negotiating data point: the longer Ukrainian forces hold on these three sectors, the fewer cards Russia holds at the peace table. That is why every assault repelled at Pokrovsk, every drone downed over Huliaipillia, every street defended in Kostiantynivka carries diplomatic value as much as military value. The war is not fought only with weapons — it is also fought in the minds of those in Washington, Brussels, or Beijing who calculate how far they are willing to go.

Trump, NATO, and strategic patience

In that calculation, the American position is decisive. The Trump administration, engaged in parallel negotiations with Moscow, has blown hot and cold on support for Ukraine. European allies — the United Kingdom, France, Germany under new Chancellor Friedrich Merz — have taken the lead on several fronts, but cannot fully compensate for America's weight. What Trump decides in the coming weeks on arms deliveries and security guarantees will be as important as what is happening in Pokrovsk.

Ukraine is playing a two-level war simultaneously: the tactical level, where its soldiers repel 257 assaults per day, and the strategic level, where its diplomats try to maintain the cohesion of a Western coalition whose unity is never guaranteed. These two levels are inseparable. And it is on this double chessboard that the outcome of this war will be decided in the months to come.

The role of drones in the front's transformation

FPV, Shaheds and the swarm war

The war in the Donbas in June 2026 is fundamentally a drone war. Russian-sent Iranian Shaheds saturate Ukrainian air defense systems; Ukrainian FPV (first-person view) drones destroy Russian armored vehicles before they even reach the contact lines; reconnaissance drones guide artillery strikes on both sides with precision that was impossible ten years ago. In this new paradigm, bare infantry is easy prey — survival depends on mastery of the tactical airspace.

Ukraine has developed a domestic drone industry producing tens of thousands of units per month. Units specialized in counter-drone warfare have multiplied. Anti-drone tactics, from Faraday cages to portable jamming systems to drone-hunting rifles, have become standard skills for every soldier. This rapid technological adaptation is one of the Ukrainian army's competitive advantages over a Russian army more rigid in its doctrines.

The counter-battle for tactical air superiority

But Russia is not passive. Glide bombs — the FAB-500 and FAB-1500 — dropped from aircraft operating outside the range of Ukrainian medium-range air defenses, cause considerable destruction. These gliding bombs, equipped with guidance kits, can reach targets 50–70 kilometers from the releasing aircraft, making interception extremely difficult. With 310 guided bombs dropped in a single day on June 25, 2026, the tempo is frightening.

The only effective long-term response to this threat is the delivery of fourth-generation aircraft — the F-16s supplied by the Netherlands and Denmark — and long-range air defense systems capable of denying airspace to these Russian bombers. The first F-16s are in service, but their numbers remain insufficient. That is one of the capability gaps the West still needs to fill urgently.

Conclusion: Hold, at any cost

Three sectors, one reality

Pokrovsk, Huliaipillia, Kostiantynivka: three names that sum up, in this last weekend of June 2026, the state of a war that refuses to end on either side's terms. Russia pushes, gains meters at the cost of thousands of dead, and hopes the West will tire before it does. Ukraine resists, loses ground in Kostiantynivka, holds at Pokrovsk, and bets on moral and technological superiority to compensate for numerical inferiority.

The tally of June 25, 2026 — 257 engagements, 1,310 Russian soldiers eliminated, 68 artillery systems destroyed, 1,778 drones downed — is the daily reality of this war. It is not an exception. It is the norm. And behind each number there are human beings: Ukrainian soldiers holding a trench in the June heat, civilians waiting in shelters, families counting the days since the last news.

What the West must understand

The West — and particularly Washington, Berlin, Paris, Ottawa — must understand that every day of delay in arms deliveries translates into lost ground, lost Ukrainian lives, and a stronger position for Putin at the negotiating table. This is not an ideological question. It is an arithmetic question. 257 engagements per day means Ukraine needs munitions, air defense systems, drones, and continuous training — not six months from now, but now.

The Fortress Belt can hold. Kostiantynivka may perhaps be lost — some have already accepted it — but Kramatorsk and Sloviansk can be defended if the resources are there. What is happening on these three sectors right now is not the end of the war. It is its peak. And its outcome depends as much on what is decided in Western capitals as on what is fought in the trenches of the Donbas.

Conclusion: The summer front, the autumn of decisions

The war enters its decisive phase

Summer 2026 will be pivotal for the future of the conflict. Russia has launched its summer offensive campaign with an intensity unseen since winter 2022, seeking simultaneous breakthroughs on multiple axes. Ukraine is resisting with limited resources but unbroken resolve. The coming weeks — July, August, early September — will reveal whether the Fortress Belt holds, whether Kostiantynivka falls completely, and whether Western deliveries arrive in time to change the equation.

History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes. In 1944, it was the Allied industrial capacity to outpace German losses that eventually turned the war. Today, the inverse question arises: will Russia's capacity to absorb astronomical human losses outlast the Western political will to fund Ukrainian resistance? That question is not rhetorical. It is the most important question of the decade.

Three cities, one civilization

Pokrovsk, Huliaipillia, Kostiantynivka: these are not just coordinates on a military map. These are cities where people lived, worked, raised children. Streets that generations of Ukrainians walked, squares where local history was made and unmade. What Russia is destroying there is not just buildings and infrastructure — it is the memory of a people, the texture of a civilization.

And that is why this war, exhausting as it is to follow, complex as it is to understand in all its details, deserves to keep being looked at squarely. Not with resignation, not with false neutrality, but with the moral clarity that the situation demands: a free country is defending itself against an empire that wants to erase it. And the outcome of that fight concerns all of us.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

Editorial positioning

This article is an editorial analysis based on verifiable open-source material dated June 22 to 27, 2026. All military facts cited — number of engagements, Russian losses, place names, ISW and DeepState estimates — come from primary sources identified in the Sources section. Passages in italics represent the columnist's personal opinion and engage only him.

The columnist adopts a clearly stated pro-Ukrainian editorial position, grounded in the principles of international law, state sovereignty, and the defense of democracies. He does not claim false neutrality in a conflict where the aggression is documented and unilateral. No fact was invented or extrapolated without documentary basis.

Limitations and uncertainties

Military data in an active conflict zone carry margins of error and delays. Russian casualty figures are estimates from the Ukrainian command, regularly corroborated by independent sources but impossible to fully verify. The situation in Kostiantynivka evolves daily; certain elements may be outdated by the time of publication. ISW and DeepState analyses reflect their respective methodologies and may diverge on certain points.

This text was written on June 27, 2026 from data available through June 26–27, 2026. Any major front development after that date is not integrated into the analysis.

Sources

Primary sources

Ukrainska Pravda — General Staff: 257 combat engagements on June 25, 2026, 31 on the Pokrovsk axis — June 26, 2026

Ukrainska Pravda — Russia loses 1,310 soldiers and 68 artillery systems in one day — June 26, 2026

Euromaidan Press — After eight months of siege, Kostiantynivka is falling — June 25, 2026

Kyiv Independent — Analysis: Russia breaks into Kostiantynivka, opening the battle for the Donbas Fortress Belt — June 23, 2026

Secondary sources

Euromaidan Press — DeepState: two years of fighting to take all of Donetsk, with colossal losses — June 22, 2026

Euromaidan Press — What generals say about Kostiantynivka and what soldiers report are two different things — June 22, 2026

Ukrainska Pravda — 246 Russian attacks repelled in one day, maximum on the Huliaipillia front — June 22, 2026

Ukrainska Pravda — Russia attacks Ukraine with 129 drones on the night of June 26–27 — June 27, 2026