Ukrainian troops fighting on Russian soil have an advantage they’ve never had in this war

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been an unusual one, at least as far as major wars go, in that it has largely only taken place on one country’s soil, which has put Ukraine at a big disadvantage and often left its troops stuck.

But that’s no longer the case.

“It’s a huge operational advantage for a commander, where you don’t have to draw any lines in the sand, Alberque said.

When choosing where to defend in Ukraine, Ukrainian forces are ‘”not only looking at terrain, they’re not only looking at defendable positions, but they’re also looking at the symbolism of different villages that are Ukrainian, that have Ukrainian citizens, that have deep, deep roots in Ukrainian history,” he said.

“The demoralization of losing a Ukrainian village is entirely different than giving up a Russian village that the Ukrainians don’t care about at all,” Alberque said.

In contrast, in eastern Ukraine, where the war has been focused, “Ukraine really has to feel the pain of surrendering a village that they had retaken from the Russians, or a historic location that Russian forces haven’t been to before or something like that,” he said.

Ukraine is now fighting on someone else’s territory, giving Ukrainian commanders more freedom to design the fight based on what it actually needs, Alberque said, unlike back home, “where every single inch of territory lost is a dagger into the heart of all Ukrainian.”