Russia advances as war in Ukraine sees Putin’s forces adopt new tactics amid uncertainty over U.S. support

Kharkiv, Ukraine — A Russian glide bomb slammed into an apartment building overnight in Ukraine‘s second-largest city Kharkiv, injuring 12 people including a 3-year-old girl, according to local officials. The edge of Kharkiv is only about 12 miles from the front line where Ukrainian forces are battling desperately to fend off Russia’s invasion, and it’s been a frequent target of aerial attacks since that invasion began on Feb. 24, 2022.

Ukraine and Russia have been trading regular drone and missile strikes across the front line, and the Ukrainian Air Force said it destroyed 78 of 105 Iranian-made Shahed drones launched by Russia overnight at 15 regions of the country. The Russian military said 113 Ukrainian drones were intercepted overnight.

In recent months, Russia has made increasing use of its glide bombs, and it’s making a difference in the war. The weapons are made using Soviet-era munitions — some of them carrying more than a ton of explosives — which are retrofitted with wings and satellite guidance systems. They’re cheap to produce and highly destructive.

CBS News visited a detachment of the Ukrainian Border Guard tasked with scouring the skies for the Russian aircraft that launch the glide bombs, and then getting a warning out to communities in their line of fire.

Colonel Maksym Balagura, who commands the unit, told CBS News that every one of the soldiers fears for their own life when they get the signal that a glide bomb has been deployed.

“One can never underestimate the enemy,” he said, acknowledging that the tactics used by Russia’s forces have become more sophisticated as the war grinds on well into its third year.

Russia now occupies around 20% of Ukrainian territory — a vast swathe of the eastern Donbas region, and by some estimates, President Vladimir Putin’s forces are gaining ground faster than at any time since the early stages of the war.

In February, Ukrainian troops withdrew from the key eastern city of Avdiivka after it was besieged for months by Russian forces. This week, the city of Vuhledar fell to Russian control after two years of fighting. Pro-Kremlin media have posted videos showing Russian troops raising their flag atop a bombed out two-story building. Russian troops are also closing in on the city of Pokrovsk, a Ukrainian logistics hub in the east of the country.

More than 100,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in the invasion, according to U.S. officials, though neither Ukrainian nor Russian officials have confirmed their casualty figures. Despite the losses, Putin has seemed intent on pushing his gains, and Russia’s military is planning to draft more than 130,000 additional soldiers by January.

Ukraine relies hugely on weapons and other equipment being provided by the U.S. and its NATO allies to ensure it can continue fighting against Russia, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been pushing hard for permission to use Western-made weapons to strike deep inside Russian territory. 

He’s made it clear that without additional support and the ability to target Russian weapons storage and launch facilities, Russia could cement its seizure of Ukrainian land and continue pushing west into the country — toward the border with NATO member Poland.

Zelenskyy has warned for years, even before the full-scale Russian invasion, that Putin’s war on Ukraine could grow into a war with NATO.

“This aggression, and Putin’s army, can come to Europe, and then the citizens of the United States, the soldiers of the United States, will have to protect Europe because they’re the NATO members,” he told CBS News in March, reiterating that warning.

His ongoing calls for greater support come amid uncertainty over the United States’ ongoing support, with former President Donald Trump vying for re-election in November. Trump has said many times that, if re-elected, he could end the war in Ukraine “very quickly,” but he’s never ruled out pushing Ukraine to accept an agreement that would let Russia hold onto some of Ukraine’s occupied territory.

In a bid to show ongoing support, NATO’s new Secretary-General Mark Rutte, a former prime minister of the Netherlands, visited Kyiv on Thursday. He’s vowed to “step up our support for Ukraine and bring it ever closer” to the transatlantic defense alliance.

“Putin has to realize that we will not give in, that we want Ukraine to prevail in the end,” Rutte has said.

But as Russia adapts its tactics and inches further into Ukraine, Zelenskyy knows that promises from NATO’s leader alone won’t guarantee his country’s victory.

contributed to this report.