As Trump and Putin seek to force Ukraine into "peace", what's the situation in Donetsk Oblast?

The United States' attempt to push Ukraine into a "peace" deal with Russia comes at a time when the defence forces are dealing with a difficult situation at the front.

That has been the case most of the time during the nearly four years of full-scale war – Ukraine is, after all, resisting an enemy with a vastly larger and better-resourced army. Yet now, as Ukraine prepares to enter the fifth year of full-scale war, the difficulties at the front are being felt especially acutely.

The Russians are trying to completely "close off" Donetsk Oblast and push the defence forces back across the Oskil River in Kharkiv Oblast. At the same time, they are advancing actively through Zaporizhzhia Oblast, and they opened a new front in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast several months ago now.

There are several reasons why this has become possible.

Firstly, the defence forces are running out of infantry – the people who hold the front line with their bodies and rifles. And let's face it, we have not yet learned how to fight using drones alone.

Secondly, as respected military figures have pointed out both on and off the record, the decisions being made at the highest level are becoming increasingly questionable and coming too late.

Thirdly, the Russians unfortunately still have air superiority in terms of the number of drones both on the front line and 10-20 km beyond it.

On the one hand, all this might look like what US President Donald Trump calls "not having the cards". Ukraine is objectively retreating at various different speeds on several key fronts and no longer controls part of Russia's Kursk Oblast, which could have been brought to the negotiating table.

On the other hand, when you speak to the military, it becomes clear that the front is not actually collapsing. And the line of contact could still be held if Ukraine decides to keep fighting. This would require increased mobilisation; timely and competent decisions by the command; honest reporting to corps commanders, the commander-in-chief and the General Staff (this is inextricably linked to the previous point); and regaining the initiative in the air.

This is part one of a detailed overview of the situation at the front and how it could develop in 2026. This article focuses on Donetsk Oblast. In part two, to be published later, we'll cover the Russian breakthrough in Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts and the situation in Kharkiv Oblast.

The heaviest frontline battles in 2026 are likely to take place in Donetsk Oblast. In the best-case scenario, the defence forces will be fighting for Lyman, Siversk, Kostiantynivka, Druzhkivka, Myrnohrad and Dobropillia. In a more pessimistic scenario, they will be fighting for Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.

Let's outline the situation around the key cities of Donetsk Oblast, only nine of which remain.

1. Pokrovsk – largely lost. There are still Ukrainian positions on the northern outskirts of the city, but most of Pokrovsk is under Russian control. Ukrainska Pravda has information that the entire part of the city south of the railway line, which cuts the city in half, is held by the Russians. The line of contact, according to Ukrainska Pravda's information, runs almost along the northern edge of the city. The General Staff's map for the Pokrovsk front is at least a month out of date.

Belated attempts to mop up Pokrovsk did not produce the desired outcome and fundamentally could not have done so – there were already far too many Russians.

There were successful counter-actions in the neighbouring village of Rodynske, through which one of the roads to the city runs (the Dobropillia-Pokrovsk road), but it was later reoccupied by the Russians.

A recent statement by the 7th Corps of the Air Assault Forces regarding the mopping-up of central Pokrovsk does not reflect the real state of affairs, Ukrainska Pravda sources say.

The Russians have been bringing military hardware into Pokrovsk since at least 6 November. A video of them entering the city in the style of the post-apocalyptic action movie Mad Max: Fury Road – in a convoy of battered vehicles and motorbikes packed with fighters – went viral on social media.

On 19 November, the first Russian tank rolled into the city. On the 20th, propagandists posted videos of Russian troops calmly walking at full height through the southernmost neighbourhood, Shakhtarskyi.

"The f**kers' tanks are already in Pokrovsk, the f**kers' mortars are already in Pokrovsk," a deputy battalion commander on the Pokrovsk front told Ukrainska Pravda. "The story [i.e. the lies told by senior commanders – ed.] continues, they keep on playing this game. And so is the whole country. We can forget about this city. The Russians are getting ready to storm the next villages, which will fall like dominoes."

Pokrovsk is the first city in this war that Ukraine lost not on the ground, but in the air. Around August this year, the Russians established drone control over Pokrovsk's airspace with particular help from Rubicon, one of their most effective UAV units. As a result, logistics and troop rotation at positions became impossible.

There is still no unified and scalable solution for countering Russian drone pilots at the level of the defence forces.

2. Myrnohrad, a satellite city of Pokrovsk, remains under the control of Ukraine's defence forces. However, the Russians make regular attempts to enter it from different directions, including from the Pokrovsk side.

The biggest risk for Myrnohrad is the loss of the last remaining roads leading into the city, as this would "close" an existing semi-encirclement. As a reminder, the road through Pokrovsk no longer exists; access routes to Myrnohrad are limited, and the Russians are well aware of this.

One marine officer told Ukrainska Pravda: "Along the route into Myrnohrad, it's all basically a grey zone now. But instead of pulling back, we're receiving orders to bring even more people in to defend it. It seems ridiculous, to put it mildly."

3. Kostiantynivka: Russian forces have been infiltrating the city for over a month now, and firefights regularly break out. "And these aren't just sabotage groups anymore," the commander of a UAV platoon in the 93rd Brigade, which is operating on the Kostiantynivka front, emphasised in a phone call with Ukrainska Pravda.

Konstakha, as the military calls it, is fully visible to the Russians from drones, and they constantly pound it. According to reports from the 19th Corps, the Russians are sticking to their strategy of not assaulting Kostiantynivka but bypassing it, at least via Druzhkivka – in other words attempting to seize two cities at once.

This is why they continue trying to extend their pincers: the eastern one from the direction of Chasiv Yar, and the western one from the Dobropillia salient.

4. Lyman and Siversk – the gateway cities to Sloviansk. The Russians have already broken into both these cities several times, but the defence forces managed to push them out each time. Street fighting is likely to begin in both cities soon.

Long-suffering Siversk and Lyman, and the units defending them, are almost always overlooked by the press and the public, yet they are regularly assaulted by Russian forces. And on certain stretches – for example, from Nevske to Shandryholove – the Russians have advanced nearly 20 km this year. That's further than in several months on the Pokrovsk front.

Almost the only notable reporting from Lyman and Siversk has been about the Russians' brutal and agonising executions of civilians. The Russians are also infiltrating between Ukrainian positions and moving up to 5 km beyond the front line.

Russian drones have also reached one of the key roads in Ukraine's east – the Izium-Sloviansk highway. One UAV unit told Ukrainska Pravda that this became possible after Ukraine lost several high points on the Lyman front.

Let's discuss Siversk and Lyman separately.

Siversk. The pressure on this city intensified after the largely unnoticed fall of Bilohorivka in the spring.

By late autumn, Ukraine's defence forces had fully or partially lost three more villages west of Bilohorivka: Hryhorivka, Serebrianka and Dronivka. This exposed Siversk from the north and, with the loss of the Serebrianka Forest (discussed below), created a continuous corridor for the Russians running from occupied Bilohorivka and Verkhnokamianske through the forest and ultimately towards Lyman.

The capture of Siversk would open up the road to Sloviansk for the Russians.

Lyman. A detail that has not gone beyond military circles is the definitive loss of the Serebrianka Forest at the end of September this year. This is a dense forest area covering 8,000-10,000 hectares, which, together with the Siverskyi Donets River, covers a large part of northern Donetsk Oblast.

The new line of contact on this front is the Lyman-Yampil railway. Ukraine's defence forces are trying to hold this line.

After Ukrainian troops were pushed out of the Serebrianka Forest, the Russians advanced confidently towards Yampil, where a wide grey zone has now formed, and from there they have moved towards the outskirts of the previously liberated city of Lyman. Ukrainska Pravda has information that the Russians plan to bypass Lyman, as they have done with most major cities in recent years: from the east via Yampil, and from the west via Drobysheve, where a Russian presence has also been recorded.

The capture of Lyman would open up another road to Sloviansk – a shorter and more direct route than via Siversk, though it involves crossing the Siverskyi Donets River.

5. Dobropillia, Druzhkivka, Kramatorsk and Sloviansk are all fully controlled by the defence forces. They are located 10-20 km from the line of contact and regularly hit by Russian drones and guided aerial bombs.

Dobropillia and Druzhkivka are becoming less habitable by the day. Civilian evacuations from both cities have been ongoing since the summer. Kramatorsk and Sloviansk remain the last bastions of civilised urban life in Donetsk Oblast for both civilians and the military, but sadly, their prospects are also uncertain.

One UAV unit commander currently stationed in Kramatorsk told Ukrainska Pravda: "The kind of life that exists in Kramatorsk now will disappear; the city will begin to die out around April or May 2026. Sadly, by the summer Kramatorsk will have started turning into another Kostiantynivka. Things aren't going to get better."

Author: Olha Kyrylenko, Ukrainska Pravda

Translation: Anna Kybukevych and Yelyzaveta Khodatska

Editing: Teresa Pearce