Russia is obviously losing, and on the defense. Pootin is resorting to flailing around with its defense.
Really depends on how you define "losing" for Russia or "winning" for Ukraine.
As things stand, Ukraine is still unable to defend against Russian shelling of its cities and can't dislodge the Russians from their entrenched positions on occupied Ukrainian territory.
Ukraine is currently in a better position to fight this conflict to a draw and come out of the war with its sovereignty and independence intact than it had been for years. It all hinges on their continued ability to strike static high-value targets like refinieries, though. If Russia finds a solution for the drone challenge, the tides of war could quickly turn in their favor again.
Similar story in the Middle East, where the inability to fend off drone swarms is the only thing keeping Iran in the game.
The current situation kinda reminds me of the standoffs during WWI: both then and now, war grinded to an ugly stalemate based on the use of novel technology (artillery then, drones today) for which the technological counter would only be found a couple of years later. In the case of artillery-based positional warfare, the answer were tanks and aircraft which broke things up and allowed for dynamic battles again. Let's see what the answer to drones will be.
This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Jul 8 2026 03:26pm