The whole world was riveted by the Wagner Group's mutiny against the Putin regime. But the infighting in Russia did not last long enough to produce a significant shift on the battlefield in Ukraine. The Ukrainian counteroffensive is less than a month old, and already the murmurs of defeatism are starting, with unnamed "Western officials" telling CNN that it is "not meeting expectations on any front." Even Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky concedes that the counteroffensive is going "slower than desired."
In truth, the plodding pace of the advance should not be a surprise or a cause for serious concern, yet.