monstars.bsky.social @monstars.bsky.social · 08/09/2026Almost a year ago I wrote that Lyman itself wasn't the real question — Russia needed the flanks secured, the Drobysheve-Yarova line taken, the supply routes cut, before its infiltrations inside the town could mean anything. 1280
monstars.bsky.social @monstars.bsky.social · 08/09/2026That outer ring never happened. AFU denied russia the Nitrius valley and the advance near Kopanky, and unable to secure the high ground there, russian forces got pushed onto the much less comfortable Ivanivka-Oleksandrivka axis instead. 1270
monstars.bsky.social @monstars.bsky.social · 08/09/2026They never established durable control over Lyman or Yarova — small groups reached both at different points, and infiltrators pushed as far as Sviatohirsk at one point, which generated exactly the headlines you'd expect, but the operational situation behind those headlines never followed. 1280
