Once Russian loses most of its fighting age men, it can't engage in another one of those types of wars for another generation at least.
To take Bakhmut as an example, Ukraine kept feeding men into cauldrons long after they should have cut their losses because they had orders to make a stand and fight to the last for every inch of territory. This is where the phrase "meat grinder" originated - it described Russia's plan for capitalizing upon those orders.
Ukraine ended up suffering vastly worse casualties than Russia did as a result - their troops spent most of their time surrounded on 3 sides by a force with overwhelming artillery superiority. The Ukrainian soldiers fed into these cauldrons often died within hours from an artillery strike, usually without even seeing a Russian soldier. Russia tried to keep this process going for as long as possible.
Hence meat grinder.
This pattern of Ukraine prioritizing territorial gains over lives and falling into traps sprung by Russia as a result has been repeated elsewhere across the front line too, and is symptomatic of the failure of the counteroffensive.
Russia is the one that has seen massive attrition on its artillery and is constantly complaining about Ukrainian counterbattery capabilities are far superior.
Ukraine has been very clear that these areas were held to fix and attrite Russian forces. And it worked. The Russian offense culminated with basically nothing achieved and is now on the ropes with Ukraine getting awfully close to gaining fire control on the last train lines leading west in Tokmak.
Russia is the one that is notoriously throwing its men at senseless counterattacks rather than trying to maintain its own defensive lines
The offensive was initially supposed to reach Mariupol or Melitopol which would have been a legitimate success. It's ended with a promise to maybe get to Tokmak which will make zero difference strategically. It's failed - completely.
Melitopol being liberated would almost end the war giving fire control over all of crimea’s logistics and making the entire point of the war that siege.
Tokmak will not end the war, but it is THE rail line supplying the west.
I don't see you proposing an alternative to what the Ukrainians have chosen to do that doesn't leave them with a lot more territory to retake, or ceding a bunch of territory to Russia on a basically permanent basis.
And let's not forget that they're doing their damnedest to attrit Russian materiel all the while they've been fighting to hold or retake territory. Every weapon system they've been given to strike behind Russian lines and destroy materiel, they've used for that purpose. That both reduces Russia's availability materiel, and screws with their logistics by pushing back their various assets and supply depots.
Even after that though, I think they should have prioritized lives over territory. Luring Russia deeper into their territory so that their supply lines could be cut and trying to fight maneuver warfare would have worked better than trying to win a WW1 style war of attrition against an enemy 5x the power and equivalent sophistication that is fighting a war of attrition against you.
Russian logistics were only really seriously threatened by HIMARS and only then for a short period (theyve since deployed counter measures). Ukraine only really has the resources to hit propaganda targets behind enemy lines now - Russian logistics are not being threatened in any meaningful way any more.
I would calibrate the predictions you see from your sources with the predictions that they made 12 months ago. The results may surprise.
There are several technological areas where Russia is obviously ahead of the west - the two most notable being anti aircraft defences (S-400) and hypersonic missiles.
The Russian economy is struggling but not collapsing yet.
The hypersonic missiles have generally failed to beat western air defenses. The S 400s have been getting blown up with visual confirmation.
I’m curious about how this new deal would have actually stopped Russia from just invading again in the future to take more land.
Ukraine already had prior to 2014 multiple international agreements with Russia where they promised to respect Ukraines borders and sovereignty and that didn’t stop Russia violating them.
In fact this deal seems to be explicitly about allowing Russia to invade again by pledging them to stay out of defensive alliances that would finally stop and prevent Russian aggression.
> Ukraine only really has the resources to hit propaganda targets behind enemy lines now
Ukraine has destroyed one of the submarines that Russia was using to launch cruise missiles at them and has leveled the Black Sea headquarters effectively.
They are doing what Russia keeps claiming and failing to do (hitting decision making centres).