Ukrainian have been preparing for an urban warfare since 2014 Fortifying, digging in, preparing. Fighting out in the open was never a plan for Ukrainians, because they would be annihilated by the superior air and artillery power of Russians.
One of the reasons, why it takes longer for Russians to complete clear the villages, towns and cities. Ukrainians have strategically positioned themselves in or around high risk, civilian targets in order to prevent the the defense destruction by the Russian artillery. They probably did not evacuate the facilities either, for a greater impact.
950 000 Red Army soldiers died defending Stalingrad, so it wouldn’t fall in German hands and give Germans the control of the oil fields in the Caucasus. The synonym of the urban warfare. The strategic importance was to hold the positions in the city, not to have a battle in the fields as some uneducated (
@Crom Valen) posters are questioning.
Ukrainian conflict is nothing similar to one of few, legitimate defense wars in the human history and to make any comparison between two is stupid and ignorant.
