[XRdsRev]

Those forces did what they were supposed to do. They diverted Russian assets away from other fronts for several weeks at a time when the Russians really could have used their troops in other locations. The writing was on the wall for those Ukrainians for awhile, there was not going to be any breakthrough to save them. Like ‘em or hate em, they did an excellent job of a undertaking a prolonged delaying action.

[Mr Ramsbotham]

And there is such thing as a Pyrrhic victory.

[JoSixChip]

Like ‘em or hate em, they did an excellent job of a undertaking a prolonged delaying action.

If you call using civilians as human shields excellent, your thought process may be all f*ed-up.

[Eagles6]

Any objective person would say the Ukrainian defenders fought courageously, even though surrounded, outgunned and greatly outnumbered.
For the Russians to “win” they had to suffer, probably, thousands or tens of thousands of casualties, slaughter untold thousands of innocent civilians and destroy virtually every standing building in the city.

[Kazan]

The plan most certainly was not for the neo-Nazis there to lose control of Mariupol and allow the Russians to build a land bridge from Mariupol to Crimea.

Mariupol was the stronghold of the neo-Nazi Avoz battalion. That's why the most intense fighting occurred there>

And, they didn't manage to divert the Russians from destroying the Ukrainian invaders further east and north in Donbass that have been waging war on the ethnically Russian population there for eight years. Those troops are cutoff and in meat grinder.

[spetznaz]

Exactly. Brave men. They did their job and did it well