Russia masses 50,000 troops around Sumy, putting Ukraine in precarious position

Holding the Russians off has become a game of whack-a-mole for outnumbered Ukrainian troops, with Russia frequently opening new lines of attack

- Ian Lovett & Nikita Nikolaienko

Russian forces are just 12 miles from this northern Ukrainian regional capital, a new target for Moscow, as the Kremlin presses its manpower advantage at a growing number of places along the front.

Having almost entirely ejected Ukrainian forces from the Russian Kursk region earlier this year, Russian forces have now poured over the border in the opposite direction toward Sumy. With 50,000 troops in the area, they outnumber the Ukrainians roughly 3-to-1, according to soldiers fighting there.

"Their main strategy," Gen. Oleksandr Syrskiy, Ukraine's top military commander, said of the Russians, is to "wear us down with their numbers."

The Russian advance toward Sumy comes as President Trump has begun voicing growing frustration with the Kremlin's unwillingness to broker a cease-fire. Though meetings between Ukrainian and Russian officials have continued in Turkey throughout recent weeks, Moscow has stepped up its missile and drone attacks on Ukrainian cities during that same period. Overnight on Sunday, Ukraine lost an F-16 jet fighter and its pilot during an aerial bombardment, the largest since the start of the war in terms of numbers of munitions launched.

Over the past year, the front line has grown by more than 100 miles, Syrskiy said, and now stretches more than 750 miles in an arc from the northeast to the south. The Russians have been probing in different spots across the line, and then pushing hard when they find one that gives, as they did in Sumy last month. That leaves Ukrainian commanders playing whack-a-mole, sending in elite units to help plug gaps.