SUBSCRIBER+EXCLUSIVE REPORTING — As Russian troops closed in on the city of Avdiivka last week, Ukrainian forces were hunkered down and making life-and-death calculations with their dwindling stocks of ammunition: Should they fire more artillery shells to fend off the Russians – or guard their stocks before they ran out? In the end, Russia’s firepower proved too much for the Ukrainians; the Russians gained two footholds in Avdiivka, forcing commanders to abandon a position their troops had held at the cost of thousands of lives. Late last week, they ordered a full retreat from the battered city, handing Russia its most significant battlefield victory in more than a year.
The loss of Avdiivka was perhaps the war’s most profound example of what National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has called a “math problem” for Ukraine: the fact that the number of artillery shells its forces use in a given day has challenged the ability of Western supporters to keep up the supply. But with the fate of all U.S. military aid now up in the air, Avdiivka’s fall also presents a case study for what may follow.
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