Saks said that he believes Russia's Kharkiv offensive was never meant to reach the city of Kharkiv itself.

According to the expert, the only serious offensive is taking place in Donetsk, near Avdiivka. "Russian units have been making slow progress there over the past three months. The Ukrainians haven't managed to stop the advantage, while a major breakthrough also hasn't happened."

Ukraine has managed to stop Russia's offensives in other parts. "We are not seeing major change in terms of the front line," Saks said.

He noted that permission from the West for its weapons to be used to hit military targets inside Russia is already affecting the course of the war.

"If Russia attempted a diversion near Kharkiv, it has cost them dearly. Mostly because they painted it as a major offensive in the media. To make it look like they were really going after Kharkiv. The effect was the opposite. It caused the West to lift restrictions on the use of its weapons," Saks suggested.

"Now, Ukraine has at its disposal more accurate and effective weapons. This has solved two problems. One is that Russian artillery was constantly firing at Kharkiv. Because Kharkiv lies 40 kilometers from the border, the Russians were using S-300 missile systems to hit the city, and these attacks caused a lot of human casualties," the expert said.

By being allowed to use American weapons to fire inside Russia, Ukraine has managed to destroy these [S-300] systems. "The result is that Russia no longer has decent air defenses near Belgorod and Kharkiv hasn't been hit for almost two weeks now."

The other thing is that Ukraine was given the ability to hit Russian military logistics in Russia. It was easy for the Russians to handle logistics near the border as long as they knew Ukraine couldn't fire at them. "That party is now over," Saks said.

The security analyst also suggested that Ukraine's permission to use HIMARS and other weapons to hit Russian territory came suddenly for the Russians, which is why its losses have been considerable. "It has pretty much halted Russia's offensive activity near the border."

But Saks added that it remains a problem for Ukraine that Russia is using glide bombs to attack Ukraine, with the aircraft taking off from airfields that are far away from the border. He said that if Russia was forced to move its aircraft even deeper into Russia, the glide bomb attacks would be less frequent.

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