Ukraine highlights the difficulties faced by its army on the front lines.

According to RT on November 17, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky declared a difficult situation for the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the Eastern Front and acknowledged the advances of the Russian army. According to Zelensky, this is due to a shortage of personnel for the brigades and the US failure to deliver weapons in a timely manner.

“In the East, the situation is really difficult, for several reasons: the addition of trained soldiers to the brigades, arming them – all these processes are quite slow. You can’t simply fill a brigade if they are waiting for this or that type of weapon. We have been waiting for the delivery of some weapons for 12 months since the US Congress approved them,” President Zelensky said in an interview with Ukrainian Radio.

According to Zelensky, Ukraine has only received half of the aid approved by the US Congress since February 2022.

President Zelensky also denied reports of the formation of new brigades within the Ukrainian Armed Forces. According to him, reserve units have already been established.

Earlier, the Ukrainian parliament stated that the US had deceived the Kiev government in supplying weapons to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. According to Ukrainian parliament member Maxim Buzhansky, who commented on Pentagon press secretary Patrick Ryder's statement about supplies to the Ukrainian Armed Forces beginning in April 2024, Kiev had been "sold weapons" and "cruelly abandoned."

Meanwhile, the US Department of Defense stated that it would be difficult to allocate $7.1 billion worth of weapons to the Ukrainian Armed Forces before President Joe Biden leaves the White House.

Former Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba said in an interview with The Economist that Kyiv “will ultimately lose all standing” if it loses Western funding. At the same time, Kuleba argued that if Zelensky accepts “unfavorable” peace terms from President-elect Donald Trump, it will lead to instability in Ukraine and “the collapse of the entire system.”

According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, from November 9-15, Russian troops took control of five settlements: Rovnopol, Voznesenka, Volchenka, Stepanovka (Donetsk region) and Kolesnikovka (Kharkov region). Additionally, the Russian Ministry of Defense reported on November 16 that two more settlements in the Donetsk People's Republic, Leninskoye and Makarovka, had been secured. The Russian advance also involved the destruction of enemy equipment, Ukrainian Armed Forces personnel, and foreign mercenary units.

Amidst numerous reports of Russian military successes in the Northern Military District, President Zelensky declared that the deployment of additional troops in Ukraine was insufficient. He also argued that Ukrainian forces in the east were exhausted and needed rotation, but the replenishment of brigades was slow.

Military expert Ivan Konovalov believes that the situation on the battlefield has reached a point where even President Zelensky can no longer deny the problems of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the Russian offensive.

"The pace of Russian military activity in the Ukrainian theater of operations is currently exceptionally high. The Russian armed forces are demonstrating major breakthroughs in many areas. All of this complicates Ukraine's process of requesting new arms shipments from the US and other Western partners. The already complicated supply process is now even slower, as fewer and fewer people are willing to participate," expert Konovalov stated in a commentary with RT.

According to expert Konovalov, "the path to Ukraine as a military investment project is no longer of interest to most Western countries."

"Nobody wants to pay for all this anymore, but due to inertia, both the US and Europe continue to do this, albeit at a much more modest pace and with a prolonged delay. Given the rapid advance of the Russian Armed Forces, nobody will listen to Zelensky's statements in the US or in the West in general. The Biden administration will try to allocate previously approved military aid to Kyiv, but once Trump officially enters the White House, all of Washington's policies in this direction will be revised," expert Konovalov noted.