Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine’s former commander-in-chief and current ambassador to the United Kingdom, has delivered his first detailed public reflection on two of the most significant military operations of the past years - the 2023 counteroffensive and the 2024 incursion into Russia’s Kursk Oblast. Writing in the Ukrainian outlet Dzerkalo Tyzhnia (Mirror of the Week) on September 24, Zaluzhnyi concluded that both operations had fallen short of their intended objectives and carried a cost that he described as “too high.”

In his essay, Zaluzhnyi revisited the challenges of the 2023 counteroffensive, which he directed while still head of Ukraine’s armed forces. He explained that the campaign had stalled because of a lack of sufficient assets and manpower in the assault formations. To break through heavily fortified Russian defenses, he argued, Ukraine would have needed decisive superiority in firepower and the ability to rapidly deploy mobile reserves into the breach before Russian reinforcements could reorganize. According to him, this level of capability was never achieved, due to both objective limitations and subjective factors.

He noted that the operation was further complicated by the premature exposure of Ukraine’s plans, which he said turned the counteroffensive into a “reality TV show.” Sensitive details leaked into the public domain, allowing Russian forces to anticipate Ukraine’s moves. By late 2022 and into 2023, the fighting around Donetsk had already taken on the character of positional warfare, echoing the stalemates of World War I. Russia, Zaluzhnyi observed, gradually pressed forward through relentless pressure rather than through decisive maneuvers, leaving Ukraine with limited options for breakthroughs or encirclements.

Turning to the 2024 Kursk operation, Zaluzhnyi acknowledged the boldness of the move, which marked Ukraine’s first major offensive on Russian soil. Beginning in August 2024, Ukrainian forces advanced into Kursk Oblast and initially seized around 1,300 square kilometers (roughly 500 square miles). The goal, designed under his successor Oleksandr Syrskyi, was to force Moscow to divert troops from eastern Ukraine and prevent an anticipated Russian push into Sumy Oblast.

While the opening stages of the campaign surprised many observers, the success proved fleeting. Russia, supported by the deployment of some 12,000 North Korean troops, mounted a counteroffensive in spring 2025 that recaptured most of the territory Ukraine had taken. Zaluzhnyi reflected that limited incursions could sometimes be justified if their costs, especially in human lives, remained proportionate and the objectives narrow. But in this case, he said, the lessons were clear: an isolated tactical breach in a confined sector does not translate into operational success. Russian forces, he added, were able to capitalize on technological and tactical advantages, first stalling Ukraine’s gains and then reversing them.

This perspective diverges from Syrskyi’s own assessments. Throughout the year, the current commander-in-chief emphasized the heavy toll Russia suffered during the campaign, citing in July that Moscow had lost as many as 80,000 troops killed or wounded. Syrskyi did not disclose Ukrainian losses but insisted Russian casualties were far higher, framing them as the operation’s principal achievement. Analysts, however, remain divided. Some continue to see value in the temporary disruption caused to Russian planning, while critics argue the effort drained Ukraine’s resources without halting Russian advances in Donetsk Oblast.

Zaluzhnyi summed up his position by stating that both the 2023 counteroffensive and the 2024 Kursk incursion demonstrated the limits of tactical breakthroughs when broader operational conditions are unfavorable. The inability to exploit a breach and move forces into the operational depth, he argued, meant that Ukraine could not achieve lasting success. What remained, in his view, was a positional stalemate shaped as much by operational shortcomings as by the resilience of Russian defenses.

President Volodymyr Zelensky later confirmed that plans for the 2023 counteroffensive had fallen into Kremlin hands even before operations began, underscoring the vulnerabilities Ukraine faced at the time. Zaluzhnyi, who had been dismissed as commander-in-chief in February 2024 and appointed ambassador to the U.K. that July, now frames these episodes as lessons learned in a war increasingly defined by attrition and deadlock rather than sweeping offensives.