 Russia is advancing in five directions at once. This is the most dangerous situation since the war began. The New York Times reported this. We are talking about Abdiyivka, Marinka, Robatine, Kremlin and Bakhmut directions. It is noted that now destroyed city of Abdiyivka covers only some 12 square miles. But for the better part of a decade it carved a bulge in the front line that undermined critical Russian logistical operations. Roughly 50,000 Russian soldiers have been dedicated to the fight for Abdiyivka in this direction. Although the numbers fluctuated.by last month, Russian forces had finally cleared out the last Ukrainian defenders of Marinka, another longtime front line town, there is very little left of Marinka after two years of Russian bombardments and battles. But its capture has allowed the Russians to turn their attention to the south and another vital Ukrainian stronghold, Volodar. It is not clear how many forces the Russians have amassed in this direction, but Ukrainian officials have said Russia has kept around 40,000 in the nearby Mariupol area to be deployed for attacks from the south when Ukraine's failed summer counteroffensive culminated last year. Its forces had managed to advance only about 10 miles deep into the southern front, reaching just beyond a tiny village, Robatine. The Russian military has more troops concentrated on this front than on the Abdiyivka. Front, Dmitry Lakovii, a spokesman for Ukrainian soldiers fighting in the south, said. Russia is pushing from Kremlin to reclaim towns in the northeast had lost to Ukraine in late 2022. Russia has maintained a total force of around 110,000 troops in the area for months, despite losses, Ilya Evlash, a spokesman for the military in the area, told reporters earlier this month. Russia destroyed and then seized the city of Bakhmut in May, its last significant territorial gain on the battlefield before advancing on Abdiyivka this week. Some 62,000 Russian soldiers are on the ground in the Bakhmut direction, according to Ukrainian estimates.So, Russia is trying to return territories that the Ukrainian armed forces liberated during counter-offensives in 2022 and 2023.