KYIV, Ukraine — This nation is worn out.
For nearly 18 months, Ukraine has stood against its Russian invaders — rallying support for its troops by embracing last year’s battlefield victories in the Kyiv, Kharkiv and Kherson regions.
Those wins carried beleaguered Ukrainians through a winter of airstrikes on civilian infrastructure and a brutal and symbolic battle for Bakhmut, the eastern city that fell to the Russians in May.