PlumBirch Culture

With Bakhmut in Ruins, Ukraine Shifts Focus

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The eastern city of Bakhmut, site of the longest and bloodiest battle of the war in Ukraine, is almost entirely obliterated.

After 10 months of fierce fighting, the city appears to have fallen to the Russians. The Kremlin yesterday claimed victory and Ukraine conceded that only a small contingent of soldiers remained inside the city. Kyiv’s military commanders are shifting their focus to the city’s outskirts.

“By the time Russia declared victory over the ruins, it was clear the city was all but lost,” said my colleague Marc Santora, who reported from the Bakhmut region last week. But there’s an ongoing fight for land surrounding Bakhmut, including high ground taken by Russian forces over the winter.

Marc told me: “The city itself is gone — destroyed and under the control of the Russians — but the battle for Bakhmut is not yet over.” Russia controls much of the area, but the Ukrainians have made small gains in recent weeks. (Here are maps laying out who holds what territory.)

The capture of Bakhmut, if confirmed, would represent Russia’s first major battlefield victory in Ukraine since last summer — though for both sides the battle was more symbolic than strategic. Some analysts even suggested that Ukraine’s ability to grind down Russia’s troops there could still prove beneficial to its war effort, as it prepares for a counteroffensive.

My colleague Thomas Gibbons-Neff, a former Marine, points out that whatever the result of the fighting in Bakhmut, it came at the cost of unfathomable loss. He writes: “How do you remember the dead, and prepare for what you fear will be the calculated indifference of your leaders, who are plotting their next campaigns, with battles that might lead to your own demise?”

Arizona, California and Nevada have agreed to take less water from the drought-strained Colorado River, as part of a breakthrough agreement announced today. The deal would temporarily keep the river from falling so low that it would jeopardize the water supply to cities like Phoenix and Los Angeles and to some of the country’s most productive farmland.

Drought, population growth and climate change have dropped the river’s flows by one-third in recent years compared with historical averages, threatening to provoke a water and power catastrophe across the West. Last summer, the water levels in reservoirs along the river fell so low that officials feared the hydroelectric turbines they powered might cease operating.

The deal is only a temporary solution; it expires at the end of 2026. The Colorado River supplies drinking water to 40 million Americans.

For more: Take a look at what’s using all the water.

President Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy were meeting at the White House after negotiations on averting a default on the nation’s debt faltered over the weekend. Without a deal over how to raise the nation’s debt limit, the U.S. could be unable to pay its bills as soon as June 1, the Treasury Secretary reiterated today. Follow our live coverage.

Discussions of a debt deal have centered on spending caps: The Biden administration and House Republican leaders have agreed in broad terms to some limits on federal spending for at least the next two years. But they are hung up on the details.

The Chinese city of Zibo, a once-obscure chemical manufacturing city in the Shandong Province, is suddenly overrun with tourists. The reason: barbecue.

Drawn by social media posts and cheap prices, 4.8 million people visited the city in March. Zibo’s barbecue festival has hundreds of grills scattered across an area the size of 12 football fields, but they often become available only after hourslong waits. The experience is rounded out with concerts, neon lights and a mascot dressed like a meat skewer.

Despite the boon, not everyone in Zibo is thrilled about living in China’s hottest tourist destination. Last month, the local government urged people to visit other nearby cities.

The N.B.A. conference finals are designed to be all-out battles between the two best teams in the East and the West. But so far both series have been lopsided.

The Miami Heat blew out the Boston Celtics last night, pulling to 3-0 in the series (the first team with four wins advances). Miami’s Jimmy Butler was too much for the Celtics to handle in the first two games, before he stepped back to play a supporting role yesterday.

In the West, the Denver Nuggets lead the Los Angeles Lakers 3-0, and they could punch their ticket to the finals tonight at 8:30 p.m. Eastern. The Nuggets’ biggest weapon: Nikola Jokic, who has mastered the art of taking it slow.

Roughly 252 million years ago, erupting supervolcanoes plunged the planet’s living things into a series of extinctions. It was a horrible time to live, and scientists have long believed that large predators had too little food to survive. But at least one did, according to new research.

A saber-toothed beast named the gorgonopsian appeared unexpectedly, then vanished, at the very end of the extinction event. With no true competitors, it hunted herds of prehistoric plant-eaters in southern Africa. The discovery helps unlock some of the extinction dynamics of that time, which could be useful in understanding today’s ecological crises.

Have a resilient evening.

Thanks for reading. I’ll be back tomorrow. — Matthew

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