In the years before Russia's all-out war on Ukraine, Kostyantynivka was better known as a city of 66,000 with a thriving glassmaking industry, a strategic location at the crossroads of two major highways, and a busy railway junction.These days, Kostyantynivka is a crater-pocked wasteland of smoldering rubble leveled by drones, artillery, and, in recent weeks, devastating Russian glide bombs.Russian forces are hell-bent on capturing the city, an important part of what's known as the "fortress belt" -- a major line of Ukrainian defenses for the eastern region of Donetsk.With small pockets of Russian troops reported in the city's western, southern, and eastern districts, Kostyantynivka is in danger of falling entirely sometime before summer's end, according to some analysts, open-source intelligence experts, and Ukrainian and Western observers.
Ukraine's struggle in Kostyantynivka stands in contrast to the success of its long-range drone campaign against Russian oil refineries, which has led to nationwide gasoline shortages and mounting headaches for the Kremlin.It's a grim reminder of the fight that outgunned and outmanned Ukrainian troops are still waging against a Russian Army willing to incur mindboggling losses."The situation around Kostyantynivka is developing into the most difficult scenario," Deep State, an open-source research group with ties to Ukraine's military, wrote last month. Russian forces have "literally reached the outskirts of the city from all sides and [are] exerting active pressure and seeping into the depths of the settlement."
