Both sides are exhausted, have suffered heavy casualties and face increasingly difficult fighting conditions as winter closes in, temperatures drop and visibility worsens. Security and Defence Editor @haynesdeborah A very public decision by Russia to order the withdrawal of its forces from the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson appears to be a necessary humiliation. Exposed on the west bank of the Dnipro River, commanders faced the choice of staying and slowly dying under Ukrainian bombardment or retreating and living to fight another day. Ukrainian troops will rightly be wary of a trap, designed to draw them forward into Russian fire. But if - as it seems - President Vladimir Putin's forces are genuinely retreating to new defensive lines on the opposite side of the river, it will mark an important win for Ukraine as well as a much-needed psychological boost after more than two-and-a-half months of a bloody counter-offensive in the south. The big question now is whether the Ukrainians