"The enemy stopped advancing head-on": Military expert explains the situation at the Hulyaipole front

Military expert Oleg Starikov discussed the situation at the Zaporizhzhia front, how the enemy began to advance, and explained why it is crucial to hold Hulyaipole, according to Politeka.

He shared these insights on his channel.

As the expert notes, the Eastern Zaporizhzhia front, which can now be called the Hulyaipole direction, was initially a secondary or diversionary strike direction. The Russian command, he states, has changed its usual tactics there, which has created a complex situation. The enemy has adopted a new strategy since 2025 across the entire line of contact.

“There’s a steppe there, but what is the enemy doing? First of all, the enemy is no longer advancing head-on. They have stopped frontal assaults, no longer conducting meat assaults; instead, they are flanking. The Russians began flanking; they are not engaging in direct combat and at the same time are preventing our drone operators, the UAV forces, from establishing positions,” explains Oleg Starikov.

In other words, the expert claims, the Russians are carrying out a slow advance on the flanks, a concept known in military science. What happens, he says, is that the Ukrainian forces retreat, just starting to secure their positions, while the Russians immediately strike with FABs, KABs (types of bombs), advancing about one kilometer per day on the Hulyaipole front.

"Why is Hulyaipole dangerous? I’ll tell you that Hulyaipole is a very serious operational-level fortification, comparable to Pokrovsk, and slightly smaller than the Sloviansk-Kramatorsk agglomeration. Just a bit smaller. But if you consider that one is in the North and the other in the South, this is essentially the same type of operational-level fortification. The Sloviansk-Kramatorsk agglomeration, however, is of strategic importance. So, the loss or the threat of losing this fortification would lead to tactical and operational-tactical crises," concludes Oleg Starikov.

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