The failure of Russian mercenary troops

 ISW:

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Wagner financier Yevgeny Prigozhin’s star has begun to set after months of apparent rise following his failure to make good on promises of capturing Bakhmut with his own forces. Russian President Vladimir Putin had likely turned to Prigozhin and Prigozhin’s reported ally, Army General Sergey Surovikin, to continue efforts to gain ground and break the will of Ukraine and its Western backers to continue the war after the conventional Russian military had culminated and, indeed, suffered disastrous setbacks.[1] The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and General Staff, headed by Sergey Shoigu and Army General Valeriy Gerasimov respectively, had turned their attention to mobilizing Russian reservists and conscripts and setting conditions for improved performance by the conventional Russian military, but they had little hope of achieving anything decisive in the Fall and early Winter of 2022. Putin apparently decided to give Prigozhin and Surovikin a chance to show what they could do with mobilized prisoners, on the one hand, and a brutal air campaign targeting Ukrainian civilian infrastructure on the other. Both efforts failed, as Prigozhin’s attempts to seize Bakhmut culminated and Surovikin’s air campaign accomplished little more than inflicting suffering on Ukrainian civilians while expending most of Russia’s remaining stocks of precision missiles. Prigozhin seems to have decided in this period that his star really was on the ascendant and that he could challenge Gerasimov and even Shoigu for preeminence in Russian military affairs. Those hopes now seem to have been delusional.

Putin appears to have decided to turn away from relying on Prigozhin and his irregular forces and to put his trust instead in Gerasimov, Shoigu, and the conventional Russian military once more. Putin began to re-centralize control of the war effort under the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) in early December.[2] He gave Gerasimov overall command of the Joint Grouping of Forces in Ukraine on January 11, subordinating Surovikin to Gerasimov along with two other deputies.[3] The Russian MoD announced large-scale reforms to expand and reconstitute the Russian Armed Forces on January 17.[4] Ukrainian intelligence and select Kremlin officials have also reported that Putin is preparing to launch a second wave of reserve mobilization to expand the Russian Armed Forces, and the Russian MoD has been attempting to improve the professionalism of its conventional forces and to test the effectiveness of its chains of command.[5] Such reforms and appointments mark a significant inflection in the Kremlin’s efforts to reconstitute its conventional military and a deemphasis of short-term mitigation efforts such as the use of irregular formations on the frontlines.
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Putin is also attempting to rebuild the Russian MoD’s authority and reputation, both of which had been badly damaged by failures in 2022 and heavily attacked by the siloviki faction for many months. Putin’s turnabout became most evident when he pointedly did not credit Prigozhin or his Wagner forces for the capture of Soledar during a federal TV interview on January 15.[8] The Russian MoD also originally did not recognize Wagner as a participant in the Battle for Soledar, only to vaguely acknowledge Wagner assault units in a follow-up announcement on January 13.[9] Prigozhin and his allies had been fighting to claim credit for gains around Bakhmut and the capture of Soledar for some time, making Putin’s decision to walk back Russian MoD’s acknowledgment of Wagner a major defeat for Prigozhin.[10]
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The fact is that neither the Russian military nor the mercenaries have been capable of making the kind of progress Putin wants in Ukraine.  It is also remarkable that it took a war to make Russia's leadership understand how weak and ineffective their military was from top to bottom.  If their conventional military had been effective they would never have needed or wanted to use the Wagner mercenaries.

The Russian military has been poorly run on several levels.  They have sent troops into combat who have not been adequately trained and they have failed to supply them with food and equipment in many cases.  I suspect they have also failed to adequately take care of the wounded.  They have also been bogged down fighting over areas of little importance.  Why conduct a siege-like operation on an insignificant town like Soldar?  The smart move would have been to bypass it and go for areas of more strategic importance.

See, also:

Poland Aims to Push Smaller Group of Nations to Send Tanks to Ukraine

Germany said it would not fight Poland’s move to ship German-made tanks, which Ukraine has said are essential to fighting off a Russian advance.