It's sounding as if Ukrainian President Zelensky's recently revealed, top-secret plan for "victory over Russia" was not only poorly received among his Western allies, but perhaps unfortunately timed as well. While Zelensky was making his case for bigger and better weapons with the ability to strike far inside Russia's borders, Putin's forces in the eastern Donbas Oblast retook the key town of Vuhledar, the site of some of the most intense fighting seen on the eastern front. The Ukrainian forces had largely been routed from the area previously but had continued to hold on despite significant losses in troops and artillery. Last night, however, the Russian flag was raised above the town's center and the Ukrainian commanders on the ground were forced to admit that they had pulled back to avoid being encircled and having their remaining troops being either captured or killed. (CNN)

Russia has captured the key eastern Ukrainian town of Vuhledar, ending months of resistance and underscoring the scale of Kyiv’s challenge as it heads into its third wartime winter.

Footage verified by CNN showed troops waving the Russian flag over the ruins of the city hall of the devastated town, whose population has dropped from around 14,000 to just over a hundred.

Ukraine’s military confirmed its withdrawal from Vuhledar Wednesday, noting Russia had managed to send reserves on the flanks, leading to the “threat of encirclement.” The decision to withdraw, it said, was taken “to save personnel and military equipment.”

A key goal of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is to take the whole of the eastern Donbas region. Russia has been making incremental gains this year in the east and the loss comes as Ukraine’s President Zelensky returns from a meeting with US President Joe Biden without his key demands met.

Ukrainian military bloggers and analysts were quick to point out that Vuhledar was an important target for Russia's aspirations in the eastern part of the country. While it was neither a military nor strategic center of operations for the Ukrainians, the town occupied the high ground in that region, with many pieces of artillery placed in tall apartment buildings where they could fire upon the advancing Russian troops with impunity. Russia suffered some of its heaviest casualty numbers there over the past year or more, but they simply kept throwing more bodies and more armor at the region until they finally forced the remaining Ukrainians to flee.

Perhaps more significantly, Russia had quietly moved a large number of reserve troops into the eastern side of Vuhledar in recent weeks. This made it clear that the Ukrainian incursion into the Kursk Oblast had not caused the Russians to draw down their offensive forces in the fashion that Zelensky predicted when he first moved his own troops onto Russian soil. As another Ukrainian military analyst put it, this was not a case of the Russians having a superior strategy, but rather a simple case of brute force eventually forcing an outcome that seemed predestined from the beginning.

There aren't many assessments of the current situation that don't include the word "bleak." Jane Lytvynenko of the Wall Street Journal observed that "Ukrainian troops are outnumbered and outgunned, with little prospect of significant relief." At The Atlantic, Anne Applebaum concluded that "There is only one way the Ukraine war can end." In case you were wondering, the answer to that puzzle is for "Russia to stop fighting." That would certainly do the trick, but who will convince Russia to go along with the plan?

There is no way to paint an optimistic picture of this development. Vuhledar was one of those bargaining chips that Ukraine might have been able to use if they were already engaged in talks to reach a negotiated settlement to the war. Securing the entire Donbas Oblast was one of Russia's stated objectives from the beginning. If that had been put on the table, offering Putin a way to avoid the huge number of casualties that the prolonged battle generated, he might have been willing to consider coming to the table. Now we will likely never know. Allowing Putin to lay claim to the region without giving up anything in return may well make the Kremlin more willing to go "all in" and simply take the entirety of Ukraine.