The broader counteroffensive reduced Russia’s average daily advance in 2026 to 0.25 square kilometers while Russian casualties reached nearly 37,000 by late October, exceeding the 31,270 recorded for all of October 2025 and outpacing Russian recruitment, according to ISW. Across four previously disclosed phases of Operation Vivaldi, the 3rd Army Corps reported recapturing 277 square kilometers and 16 settlements, inflicting 8,000 Russian casualties at a sevenfold lower overall casualty rate for Ukraine, and capturing about 250 prisoners, though AMK Mapping visually counted 78 to 90 captives in released footage.

To break Russian defenses and foil plans to encircle the Sloviansk-Kramatorsk urban belt, Ukrainian forces carried out 36,000 strikes on supply lines up to 150 kilometers behind the front and 15,700 ground robot missions, including Soviet-era BTR-60 armored personnel carriers converted into remote-controlled explosive vehicles. Russian military bloggers attributed the collapse of the Lyman salient in part to false battlefield reports sent up the Russian chain of command, and AMK Mapping noted that Russia’s Zapad group of forces released three-month-old and year-old footage from Nove and Ridkodub to dispute the territorial losses.