Western media wrote that in the first 72-96 hours of the attack of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, it was necessary to be on the coast of the Sea of Azov, having broken through the front, to begin the assault on Melitopol.
The first couple days of the attack were supposed to define the offensive. Western analysts focused on a lightning-fast offensive in order to achieve success, and now the operation is moving into positional battles, in fact, resembling the situation in Bakhmut where Ukraine got ground down through attrition.
Gonna be amazing to see how they try to spin this in the coming weeks. I expect that Ukraine will manage to make some sort of a breakthrough eventually, and then we’ll have a wave of exuberance in the west. Then Russia will counterattack once the offensive burns itself out and then the copium will be flowing at record levels.
The most interesting part to watch will be what happens once Ukraine burns through all the weapons and ammunition the west managed to cobble together for the offensive. This is basically the last throw.