Ukraine held back Operation Vivaldi for a year because its command judged the planned offensive insufficiently prepared, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. In an interview with Reuters in early October, he said the delay had paid off: “Thank God, we decided to postpone it for a short while, and now we have good results and fewer losses.”
Zelenskyy said Ukrainian forces had liberated approximately 125–140 square kilometres by early October and called the operation highly successful. He stressed that the counteroffensive was continuing, leaving its final result unsettled.
Operation Vivaldi is being conducted by the Third Army Corps of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the Lyman direction of northern Donetsk region. Its stated purpose is to secure advantageous defensive positions while Ukrainian forces seek to take and hold territory from Russian troops defending the area.
Brigadier General Andriy Biletsky reported the launch of the Vivaldi offensive in the Donetsk sector on September 15. Two days later, he said the operation aimed to take up advantageous defensive positions.
On September 28, Biletsky said that, during Vivaldi’s third stage, Ukraine’s Defense Forces had eliminated 2,000 occupiers and captured more than 250 prisoners. The operation has captured over 250 Russian soldiers for Ukraine’s “exchange fund”, and the capture was described as the largest surrender of occupiers into captivity in the 12 years of the war.
The Third Army Corps released new footage from the third season of Operation Vivaldi on October 3.
Zelenskyy said Ukrainian forces had suffered several times fewer personnel losses during the offensive than the Russian troops on the defensive. He said Russian losses since the beginning of the year had amounted to 30,000–32,000 people per month, including 21,000–22,000 killed and the rest seriously wounded.
He said Russian losses now stood at 42,000 losses per month and that the number of Russians killed and wounded had risen over the past two to three months. The figures, like the territorial and casualty claims from the operation, were presented by Ukrainian officials.
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