Russia is now recruiting just enough soldiers to replace its losses, and the Russian army has stopped growing. Military analyst Michael Kofman says the chance of an operational breakthrough is close to zero, dating the turning point to autumn 2025.
The Turning Point
Kofman calls 2026 Ukraine’s best year on the battlefield since 2023 and Russia’s worst. Since 2023, Moscow has recruited more than 400,000 people a year. For a time, that made its army larger and denser. Now the intake barely covers the cost of keeping it in the field. More men under arms have not translated into greater offensive power.
Ukraine made a different bet. Since 2024, it has shifted personnel and resources from mechanised units into unmanned systems. Kofman considers that among its best decisions of the war. He also credits Ukrainian strikes on Russian rear logistics with slowing offensives. He cautions that those strikes alone cannot stop an attack or create an easy breakthrough.
The Front
Kofman says the Russian plan to envelop the remaining Donbas agglomeration has failed. Ukraine eliminated the salient north of Lyman, ending the northern arm of the attempted encirclement. The southern push was stopped near Dobropillia last year.
Ukraine still has manpower problems. Unauthorised absences remain high, though more personnel are being returned to service. In Kofman’s assessment, the larger problem is how forces are formed and commanded.
Command, Not Just Numbers
Kofman strongly backs the move to a corps system. He describes the former tactical groupings as virtual command layers that got in the way. Since Mykhailo Drapatyi arrived at the General Staff, he says, it has begun giving commanders authority and support instead of dictating decisions to them. That change matters. Russian advances have so often exploited weak Ukrainian units or badly organised defences.
Russia’s ability to sustain this pace could come under threat in 2027.
Russia’s attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure remain, in Kofman’s view, Ukraine’s greatest challenge. He argues that strategic bombing does not break a country’s political will when its army holds the front. Nor does he claim Russia is out of money. His warning for Moscow is narrower and more serious: its financial elite is publicly acknowledging the war has outlasted its planned timetable, and Russia’s ability to sustain this pace could come under threat in 2027.