Over the course of several months, the high command of the Ukrainian military had been vowing to begin a long-anticipated counteroffensive to recapture territories occupied by the Russians in the south of the country. Along with Zaporizhzhia, the Kharkiv region was quickly occupied in the first days following the Russian invasion in February. The Ukrainians have long wanted to push the Russians out of the strategic grain-growing region for a slew of strategic, economic, and symbolic reasons. On Monday night, President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered another rousing nightly address to the nation at war. On this occasion, he doubled down on the Ukrainian wartime policy—and oath—to retake every centimeter of territory occupied by the Russians.
