RIGHT SPEAK: RUssian Forces Fail to Advance on 7 Fronts; UKRainian Troops Fight to Hold Back RU Offensive: ‘They Come Like Zombies’; UKR Holds New Positions on Left Bank of Kherson Oblast and Strike RUs; 70 Combat Clashes front lines Past 24hrs, LIVE UPDATES and MORE

STOCK PHOTO: 808TH SEPARATE SUPPORT REGIMENT

Russian forces fail to advance on 7 fronts – General Staff report:

A total of 33 combat engagements have taken place across the contact line over the past 24 hours. The Russians have launched 4 missile strikes and 37 airstrikes and carried out 19 attacks, using multiple rocket launchers.

Source: General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on Facebook, information as of 18:00 on 21 November

Details: Ukraine's Defence Forces are holding their positions on the Dnipro River's left bank in Kherson Oblast. They persisted in striking the Russians.

On the Kupiansk front, the Russian army conducted assault operations near the village of Synkivka and east of the settlement of Petropavlivka in (Kharkiv Oblast), where the Ukrainian Defence Forces repelled three attacks.

On the Lyman front the Russians attempted an assault near the settlement of Siversk (Donetsk Oblast) but to no avail.

On the Bakhmut front, Ukrainian defenders repelled 5 Russian attacks near the village of Klishchiivka and east of the settlement of Pivdenne (Donetsk Oblast).

On the Avdiivka front, the Russian occupying forces held unsuccessful assault operations east of Novobakhmutivka, Avdiivka, Sieverne and Pervomaiske (Donetsk Oblast), where the Ukrainian army repelled eight attacks.

On the Marinka front, the Russians led unsuccessful assault operations near the settlements of Marinka and Novomykhailivka (Donetsk Oblast), where Ukrainian forces repelled 15 attacks. --->READ MORE HERE

Photographs by Serhii Korovayny for The WSJ

WSJ: Tired Ukrainian Troops Fight to Hold Back Russian Offensive: ‘They Come Like Zombies’:

Russia is taking heavy casualties in the mud of eastern Ukraine as it presses to encircle the city of Avdiivka

Every day, groups of Russian infantry attack the tree lines and pockmarked fields east of this village, which block their push to surround the city of Avdiivka. Every day, Ukrainian troops cut most of them down.

But more Russians keep coming. Depleted Ukrainian units can’t shoot them all.

“Step by step, they take our positions,” said Lt. Oleksandr Shyrshyn, deputy commander of an understrength battalion of Ukraine’s 47th Mechanized Brigade that is defending a kilometer-long stretch of the front.

The Russian army is accepting heavy casualties as the price of inching forward. For weeks it has thrown tens of thousands of troops at Avdiivka, a shell-scarred industrial city in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine. Russia’s effort to encircle the town has become this fall’s biggest battle in President Vladimir Putin’s war to subjugate Ukraine.

Capturing Avdiivka could open up further local advances for Russia in Donetsk. It would also be a propaganda win for Putin, allowing him to claim that momentum in the war is back with Moscow.

This summer, Ukraine had hoped to take back swaths of the nearly 20% of the country that Russia currently occupies. But Russia’s well-fortified lines mostly held firm against the counteroffensive. Ukraine pounded Russian troops and logistics but used up several brigades and much Western-supplied ammunition without achieving the territorial breakthrough it wanted.

Even before Ukraine’s offensive wound down, Russia gathered reserves for its own renewed push on the eastern front.

The battle for Avdiivka could mark the beginning of many months on the defensive for Ukraine. With the U.S. in the grip of partisan paralysis and Europe struggling to boost military production, the uncertain supply of Western ammunition limits what Kyiv’s army can now attempt. Meanwhile, Moscow smells weakness.

Russia’s first attacks on Avdiivka in October failed. Columns of tanks and armored troop carriers fell prey to mines, drones and artillery. The Russians changed tactics, sending waves of infantry forward in small groups. The shift echoed Ukraine’s own switch to foot tactics in its summer offensive after losing too many armored vehicles.

Both armies are struggling to maneuver on open, mined terrain beneath skies buzzing with drones. The difference: Russia, with a population nearly four times Ukraine’s, can afford to lose untold thousands of soldiers for small gains.

Russia’s massive losses in the nearly two-year war have left its ground forces reliant on old vehicles and poorly trained conscripts, limiting its offensive potential, for now, to grinding assaults on small cities. Russia lost tens of thousands of men in the 10-month battle for Bakhmut, its last notable victory. --->READ MORE HERE