Michael Weiss and James Rushton write:

“Russia’s borders do not end anywhere” ran Vladimir Putin’s electoral slogan in January 2024, in seeming justification of a war of conquest in Ukraine meant to be over shortly after it began. But in a surprise turn two and a half years after the full-scale invasion, Ukraine decided to make good on Putin’s loose definition of sovereignty by invading the Kursk region in southern Russia on Aug. 6, in what has become the largest seizure of Russian land since World War II.

Ukraine’s top commander, Oleksandr Syrskyi, says his forces have captured about 400 square miles of the region, which is opposite the northeastern Ukrainian region of Sumy.

“The situation is stable and in our favor,” he said during a broadcast meeting chaired by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Ukrainian border raids into Russia are nothing new, although none has been undertaken with this type of forethought and ambition.

If true, in under a week Ukraine has taken more of Russia than its adversary has taken of Ukraine so far in 2024. Even if Syrskyi exaggerated, it wasn’t by much. Geolocated footage of Ukrainian troops and armor — much of it Western-provided — suggests Ukraine’s near-total control of the town of Sudzha. Footage published on social media showed a Ukrainian military unit driving through the area in an American Humvee. “This is the central square of Sudzha,” one Ukrainian soldier can be heard saying.

A subsequent video from the same military unit shows another standing in a deserted street in another part of Sudzha. A dead Russian soldier lies on the ground. No gunfire or artillery can be heard in the distance, indicating the town is uncontestedly in Ukrainian hands. In notable contrast to settlements seized by Russian forces in Ukraine, the buildings of Sudzha seem almost completely undamaged. Much of this likely owes to the little resistance Ukrainians faced in their blitzkrieg.

A Ukrainian source close to the military with firsthand knowledge of the operation told New Lines that the invading troops were shocked by how many prisoners of war they were able to capture on the Russian side and at the initial ease of their breakthrough across the border. [Continue reading…]