If you look at a nation-scale map, they have made no perceptible...

If you look at a nation-scale map, they have made no perceptible advance at all in the last 9 months. But if you zoom in on the previously-unknown small centre of Bakhmut with a microscope, they have made a stunning, rapid advance that has left Ukraine on the verge of collapse.

On the other hand, according to hotcopper, their defeat in the entire north of Ukraine, their defeat in the entire Kharkiv region, their defeat at Kherson, was of no significance.