Frustration in Russia grows over failure of its offensive ops and fear of Ukraine offensive
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Some prominent Russian milbloggers criticized the Russian military command for continuing to impale Russian forces on Vuhledar with ineffective human-wave style frontal assaults. The milbloggers claimed that current Russian tactics against Vuhledar, which include an initial frontal assault followed by assaults against fortified Ukrainian flanks, result in high Russian combat losses resulting in no gains due to challenging terrain, lack of combat power, and failure to surprise Ukrainian forces.[10] The milbloggers called on Russian forces to cut Ukrainian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) into Vuhledar both with strikes against rear GLOCs and by encircling the settlement for a multi-vector attack, but implied that Russian forces are unable to implement these suggestions due to munitions shortages and the failure to take many settlements surrounding Vuhledar.[11] Russian forces are unable to sustain any significant rate of advance anywhere on the front line using these human-wave style attacks, and the Vuhledar area once held informational significance to Russian milbloggers during the offensive for Pavlivka in in late October and early November 2022.[12] The Russian 155th Naval Infantry Brigade has been destroyed and reconstituted as many as eight times since the start of the war in large part due losses sustained during the prolonged effort against Vuhledar.[13] The re-emergence of vitriolic criticism about Russian failures near Vuhledar likely reflects the information space’s ongoing frustration with the Russian military command amid deep-seated fear about a prospective future Ukrainian counteroffensive. It is possible that Russian forces are undertaking a renewed and inconsistent push to take Vuhledar in the style of limited and localized ground attacks, though it is also possible that the sources claiming as such are engaging in circular reporting or re-reporting old events.[14]
Russian President Vladimir Putin held a meeting with the Russian Security Council likely as part of his effort to portray himself as a present and effective wartime leader. The meeting centered around Russia’s effort to develop its electronics industry, though the Kremlin readout provides little detail about the meeting itself.[15] Russia has been seeking ways to mitigate the effect of Western sanctions on the Russian defense industrial base (DIB), which relies on electronics to produce advanced materiel and weaponry.[16] Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has notably claimed that Belarus can produce weapons for Russia given Belarus’s access to electronics, and Russia and Belarus recently signed an agreement on furthering their respective electronics industries.[17] This meeting likely aimed to portray Putin as holding the Russian Security Council responsible for mobilizing the DIB to meet wartime demands while not providing evidence of any progress towards this goal.
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What Russia has been trying to do at Vuhledar is clearly not working and has been costly to both troops and equipment. Most of the Russian missile attacks have focused on Ukraine's energy grid and not on Ukraine's supply lines. While those attacks have been disruptive to Ukraine's civilian operations they have been ineffective in destroying civilian morale and have had limited impact on the troops at the front. It is also clear that western sanctions are impacting Russia's industrial base and its ability to supply weapons.
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Ukrainian forces strike deep into Kherson Oblast with cross-Dnipro raids
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“It could be both military facilities and concentrations of troops, as well as the logistics system of our (military) groups,” he said. HUR estimates that Russia’s current high-precision weapon stockpile is equivalent to only 15% of what it was on Feb. 24, 2022.
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And:
Russia’s ‘Great Offensive’ fails to impress as intelligence reveals its short-lived military might
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“The Russians had counted on rapid success in some direction and on its development, but that success has not materialized.”
The only goal that remains for the occupiers is to reach the borders of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. Ukrainian intelligence knows their plans and the number of their reserves, and it was clear from the beginning of the invasion that “simultaneously conducting a large strategic offensive on two or three fronts is impossible” for the Russian Federation, said Skibitskyi.
Read also: Russia loses up to 1,500 troops every day fighting in Bakhmut, NATO assesses
When asked about the duration of Russia’s economic and military resources to continue the war against Ukraine, Skibitskyi replied that they could last until “the end of 2023, or at the most, through 2024, and that’s it.”
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And:
Russians starting to evacuate from occupied Crimea, says Ukrainian intelligence
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Russian commanders and the occupiers' administration are very active in selling real estate and taking their families out of Crimea, the intelligence representative said.
"But they told the rest, like ordinary soldiers, not to worry, that everything is calm, and everything under their control... But, it has really become a meme that the so-called ‘special operation’ (Kremlin propaganda terminology for its war on Ukraine) is going according to plan... Families associated with Russians are being taken out, and quite promptly. And it is a sign for all those who tied their destiny with the criminal Kremlin regime."
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And:
Ukrainian children reveal scale of abuse at Russian 're-education' camps
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The boy said the camp’s director told him that his parents had decided to give him up and that he would be put up for adoption. He said he then called his mother, who told the administration she had no such thing in mind.
The camp administration reportedly told the boy’s mother at some point: “You’re not going to take them anyway. They will be children of Russia.”
The repatriation was carried out less than a week after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s children’s rights ombudsman, over Russia’s suspected involvement in the unlawful deportation and transfer of children from Ukraine’s occupied territories.
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And:
Private Chat Leaks Show Moscow Officials in State of Panic Over Putin Arrest Warrant
While Moscow has publicly dismissed the Hague’s arrest order for Vladimir Putin as nothing more than a meaningless piece of paper, some government officials reportedly descended into a full-blown panic in private chats after the news broke—with some wondering if they’d become the next Heinrich Himmler and Joseph Goebbels.
That’s according to a new report from the independent outlet Verstka, which spoke with sources close to the Kremlin and several sources in parliament about the reaction behind the scenes.
The news spread “like fire” in private chats between officials in the presidential administration, one source close to the Kremlin said, adding that reactions were “strong, mostly unprintable.”
“There was a sense that they [in the West] had crossed the line, that it was like a slap in the face for all of us,” he said.
Others suddenly began to realize that they too could face war crimes charges.
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The government is now working with more than 80 Ukraine-based drone manufacturers, Ukraine's Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov told Reuters. He said Kyiv needs hundreds of thousands of drones, many of which it is looking to source from a rapidly-expanding domestic industry. Currently, the military operates dozens of models of domestic and foreign drones that fulfil a “wide spectrum” of roles, Reznikov said, in written responses to questions.
"Drones are potentially a game-changer on the battlefield in the same way that precise Western MLRS became last year," Reznikov said, referring to Multiple Launch Rocket System weapons.
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And:
Two former Microsoft execs are building ‘game-changing’ drones in Ukraine to combat Russian forces
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Ukraine's Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov told Reuters that companies like AeroDrone are one of more than 80 domestic producers whose drones form a key part of military strategy.
He said the drones can fulfill a wide range of tasks thanks to their cargo-carrying abilities and their travel capabilities, meaning they are "potentially a game-changer on the battlefield".
In written responses Reznikov added that Ukraine is nowhere near parity with Putin's forces, saying the Russians too were working on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV).
Determined to stay ahead, Ukraine's President Zelenskyy has pledged a spend of nearly $550 million on drones as well as creating new assault units within his country's Air Force.
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While the US has mainly focused on drones for aerial surveillance, Ukraine has found other military uses for drones including the delivery of weapons and as a replacement for more expensive missiles.
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