How Ukraine is losing the Donbas

As Russia’s war in Ukraine nears its fourth year, Kyiv appears to be slowly losing the Donbas, a region once known as the country’s industrial heartland and symbol of national resilience. Today, as dwindling Western aid and Moscow’s mounting manpower shift the balance of the war, this strategic region is being surrendered not through a single decisive battle, but piece by piece, town by town. 

The Donbas, made up of Donetsk and Luhansk, is prized by both sides for its coal, steel, and fertile farmland, and for its symbolic importance. For Moscow, it represents a promised victory; for Kyiv, it’s a bastion of the country’s integrity.

In late October, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Russia had amassed 170,000 troops in the Pokrovsk sector in the eastern Donetsk region in an attempt to capture the stronghold city. For more than one year now, Pokrovsk has endured constant drone and missile attacks. Now, the possibility that it might soon fall under Russian occupation looms over what remains of the city.

A grinding war of attrition in eastern Ukraine

Over the last three and a half years, Russia has seized two-thirds of Donetsk and nearly all of Luhansk, as well as large parts of the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions in the southeast, though Moscow doesn’t fully control them yet. Russian President Vladimir Putin has vowed that no ceasefire will occur until the Kremlin holds all of the Donbas.

This year marked a new phase: record-breaking drone and missile strikes across Ukraine have pummelled cities and towns. In the northeastern Kharkiv region, which borders Russia, Moscow’s forces are advancing towards the town of Kupiansk — a battle that could open the way for the Kremlin to seize the rest of the neighboring Donbas.

Russia is pushing towards a heavily fortified 50km “fortress belt,” four major cities and several towns that have served as a significant logistical hub for Ukraine since 2014, according to an August report by the Institute for the Study of War.

The report notes that while the campaign could take years. Moscow’s steady advances have become a part of its current offensive — a month-long brute-force campaign in which Russian troops advance along multiple points of a 1,000km front line. 

For Kyiv, holding the Donbas region is both a military and existential fight. “Ukraine is defending every inch of its territory because it is part of the nation,” said Mark Cancian, senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Yet the situation has tilted. “I expect the next few months to look like the past few months with Russian attacks continuing to gain ground slowly and Ukraine launching deep attacks on Russian facilities.” 

Military aid to Ukraine has also sharply declined. According to Germany’s Kiel Institute, which tracks defence and financial support to Kyiv, monthly military aid in July–August was 43% lower than the average for January–June 2025. According to the report, the European Union had initially stepped in after US funding dried up early in the year, but European commitments plunged over summer, leaving Ukraine with fewer resources to hold the line.

“Unfortunately, the immediate future looks like a continuation of the last year of fighting — Russia moving forward slowly but at high cost,” said Cancian.

Life on the front line in Donbas

For residents of the Donbas, the slow-motion erosion has been devastating. The Parliament has made more than a dozen reporting trips to the region over the last three years, witnessing cities transform from strongholds to ruins.  

When our reporter first arrived in Pokrovsk in late October 2024, most of the pre-war population of 60,000 had already fled. Families with children had been forced to leave Pokrovsk under a mandatory evacuation. Many stores had closed and instructed employees to leave the city. City officials coordinated humanitarian aid and organized the remaining residents for winter survival, setting up a hub where they could collect food, water, medical supplies, and firewood.  

By December 2024, local authorities had evacuated, and Russian troops were just under 6km away. One month later, when The Parliament returned, the city had worsened further — with hospitals and pharmacies closed, the electricity grid destroyed, and artillery roaring overhead. 

A small number of residents remained, queuing outside a church for humanitarian aid in the snow. They told The Parliament they feared for their lives but didn’t know where else to go. A large explosion in the distance had residents jumping and stray dogs running away. 

In one neighborhood, Natasha, 40, and her neighbours stood beside a communal generator charging their phones. “The situation is quite tense,” said Natasha, who asked her surname be withheld out of fear for her safety. “People aren’t leaving here because they have nowhere to go and nothing to live on,” she said, as she began to cry.

Natasha said she and her neighbours stayed, under the constant shelling, simply because they had nowhere else to go. “I don’t sleep at night, I’m constantly afraid. I hope that Pokrovsk will remain under Ukraine’s control. That’s the only thing I have left to hope for.” 

On 23 October, geolocation footage showed that isolated clusters of Russian troops had entered eastern and central Pokrovsk. Heavy fighting has raged since. Jessica Sobieski, a Russia researcher at the Institute for the Study of War, said Russia's expected seizure of Pokrovsk would degrade Ukrainian morale but wouldn't likely lead to a collapse of the front line or a Russian operational breakthrough.

However, she added that the occupation is still an existential threat. “Russia will fortify and leverage any territorial gains it has in Donbas as a military lodgment to complete the conquest of more of Ukraine.” 

A summer of terror and Russian advances

During the summer of 2025, Russian troops inched forward across the Donbas, making limited gains until August, when they surged towards Dobropillia, a small city close to Pokrovsk. Russia advanced by some 15 to 20 km towards the town in early August, before Ukraine shored up some areas of its retreating front lines.

When The Parliament visited Dobropillia on 7 and 8 August, just days before Russia launched its offensive towards the city, residents were bracing for the worst. 

“I am now losing everything. And a house and everything in the world,” said Vanya, a 21-year-old preparing to evacuate with his parents. Vanya, who has also asked his surname be withheld, called Dobropillia a “dead end road,” adding that his family wouldn’t return once they fled because “the front is coming here.”

Five days later, on 12 August, Russian forces pierced Ukraine’s defences near Dobropillia, forcing Vanya’s family to flee to Dnipropetrovsk.

A Ukrainian soldier’s breaking point

One Ukrainian soldier, who asked to be referred to by his call sign Pecheneg, was stationed in Dobropillia in August. As the Russians advanced, his brigade was nearly wiped out — pummeled by ballistic missiles and rockets, and drones that targeted them from above. 

After his brigade was pulled from Dobropillia, Pecheneg had several concussions and a dozen more ailments. He described long periods sleeping on cold, damp ground. “My body gave out. Not just physically, morally, psychologically, I just couldn’t hold on. I broke.”

Pecheneg was taken to a military hospital and declared fit for service despite his condition. Believing that he still needed medical treatment, Pecheneg asked for military leave. It was granted, and he never came back. Now hospitalised in Kyiv, he considers himself a deserter. 

“I think that for soldiers personally, the loss of Donbas no longer means anything. It’s scorched earth. The cities are nothing but ruins, the fields are burned, and the land is no longer fertile,” he said.

“I stopped understanding what I’m fighting for. I have no home, no land. My family fell apart because I’m not at home.” 

Pecheng summed up the grim situation on the front lines. “Previously, our forces dominated the sky and quality of drone strikes,” he wrote on the Telegram messaging app. “Now, we’re behind and losing. The situation on the front is critical. There are not enough drones, ammunition, or people,” for Ukraine’s military to withstand Russia’s assaults.

“The enemy doesn’t care about losses, they push forward over their dead and keep advancing,” he added. 

To Pecheneg, the only remaining option is to cede Donbas, without recognising it as Russian territory. “We cannot regain [the territories] through force.” 

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