Ukraine's hopes for counteroffensive did not come true: Reasons explained

"In May, every citizen in our country wanted the war to end quickly. There were hopes, but they didn't come true. The fact that we have been defending our country for two years is already a big victory," said the Secretary of the NSDC.

Danilov noted that Ukrainians were overly optimistic.

"People sometimes make mistakes. You cannot be an A-grader all your life," he said.

He described the current situation on the frontline as "very difficult" and said that old "textbooks" for war - including Nato ones - "should be sent back to the archives".

"There hasn't been a war like the one we have in our country - not in the 20th nor the 21st Century," he said.

At the same time, Danilov refused to comment on when there would be a new push to liberate temporarily occupied territories.

"I can say for sure that we won't stop. We will continue fighting for our freedom, for our independence," he concluded.

Ukrainian counteroffensive

Ukrainian military intensified their offensive actions in the south and southeast of the country this summer.

Against the backdrop of significant attention to this topic, some Western politicians and media have already referred to the Ukrainian counteroffensive as "slow."

The Ukrainian military-political leadership has repeatedly responded to such statements.

However, later, Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, revealed that expectations of quick success did not come true, and the war is now entering a new stage. Military personnel refer to it as a "positional" war of static and exhausting combat.

Later, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Ukraine did not achieve the desired results during the summer counteroffensive by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, but the Ukrainian soldiers are not retreating.