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Ukraine Invasion Day 395: information conditions to prep a potential Ukrainian counteroffensive [1]
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Date: 2023-03-24
Ukraine signals counterattack to come 'very soon' as Wagner mercenaries suffer large losses
In today’s #RussianWarReport 🇷🇺, @DFRLab examine edited footage of a woman yelling at Vladimir Putin during his trip to #Mariupol . We also look into Ukraine’s preparations for a counteroffensive, and a missile strike in #Zaporizhzhia . These and more🧵⬇️
https://t.co/U5LJl3vdiU
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.
Prominent voices in the Russian information space are increasingly setting information conditions to prepare for a potential Ukrainian counteroffensive. Russian Security Council Deputy Head Dmitry Medvedev emphasized on March 24 that the Russian General Staff is aware that Kyiv is preparing for offensive operations and that the Russian General Staff is considering its own decisions and responses to prepare for a Ukrainian offensive.[1] A prominent Russian milblogger claimed that Ukrainian actors are disseminating disinformation about plans for a Ukrainian attack towards Belgorod Oblast, in order to draw Russian troops to border areas and allow Ukrainian troops to launch attacks on other sectors of the front, partially echoing Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin’s prior warnings about a Ukrainian push on Belgorod Oblast.[2] Another Russian milblogger warned that Ukrainian forces will likely try to launch a counteroffensive before the Russian defense industrial base (DIB) gains the capacity to increase production and bolster Russian defensive potential.[3] Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin similarly claimed on March 23 that he knows of plans for an extensive Ukrainian counteroffensive, as ISW previously reported.[4] The wider Russian spring offensive appears to be culminating, and the Russian information space appears to be responding to the slow-down of Russian operations and potential for Ukraine to regain the initiative with substantial anxiety.[5] Russian military command will need to commit a significant number of forces to the frontline to either prevent culmination or launch renewed offensive operations, and it is unlikely that such forces exist at sufficient scale to do either.
About 10,000 civilians, many of them elderly and with disabilities, are living in “very dire conditions” in and around Bakhmut, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Several thousand civilians are estimated to remain in the city itself and be “spending almost the entire days in intense shelling in the shelters”, the ICRC’s Umar Khan said.
www.theguardian.com/...
FIRES in Bakhmut
Russian Subordinate Main Effort #2—Donetsk Oblast (Russian objective: Capture the entirety of Donetsk Oblast, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)
Russian forces continued ground attacks in the Bakhmut area and have made gains in and around the city as of March 24. Geolocated footage posted on March 24 shows that Russian forces have advanced towards the T0504 Kostyantynivka-Chasiv Yar-Bakhmut highway just south of Ivanivske, about 7km southwest of Bakhmut.[22] Geolocated footage posted on March 24 additionally confirms that Russian forces have advanced west of Zalizianske (11km northwest of Bakhmut) and within northern Bakhmut itself.[23] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty noted on March 24 that Russian Airborne (VDV) and other unspecified conventional Russian forces are reinforcing the Wagner Group around Bakhmut, supporting ISW’s assessment that conventional Russian forces are likely increasingly supplanting Wagner operations in this area.[24] Cherevaty reported that there have been 32 combat clashes in the Bakhmut area over the past day.[25] Russian milbloggers claimed that Russian forces continue to fight northwest of Bakhmut in the Orikhovo-Vasylivka and Bohdanivka areas and that Russian forces are approaching Ivanivske west of Bakhmut.[26] Several Russian milbloggers additionally claimed that Wagner units are moving through the AZOM plant in northern Bakhmut and otherwise advancing in urban sectors of the city.[27] Ukrainian forces also appear to have retaken a segment of the E40 Bakhmut-Slovyansk highway north of Bakhmut, as indicated by geolocated footage posted on March 24.[28] The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian troops repelled Russian attacks on Bakhmut itself, northwest of Bakhmut near Orikhovo-Vasylivka (11km northwest) and Bohdanivka (6km northwest); west of Bakhmut near Ivanivske (5km west); and southwest of Bakhmut near Stupochky (11km southwest) and Predtechyne (14km southwest).[29]
www.understandingwar.org/...
Russian Main Effort—Eastern Ukraine
Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1— Luhansk Oblast ( Russian objective: Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and continue offensive operations into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and northern Donetsk Oblast)
Russian forces conducted limited attacks along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line on March 24. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful ground attacks near Hryanykivka (17km northeast of Kupyansk), Bilohorivka (13km south of Kreminna), and the Serebrianska forest area (10km south of Kreminna).[18] A prominent Russian milblogger claimed that positional battles continue in the Kupyansk area but the situation has not changed.[19] The milblogger also claimed that Russian forces made marginal advances northwest of Kreminna towards the outskirts of Makiivka (22km northwest) and west of Ploshchanka (16km northwest).[20] This prominent Russian milblogger used old combat footage filmed no later than November 2022 to assert that Russian forces advanced near Makiivka in March 2023.[21]
www.understandingwar.org/...
Russian authorities continue to promote contract and volunteer service aggressively while avoiding a major public wave of mobilization. Several Russian news sources reported on March 23 that Russian officials and military registration and enlistment offices use a variety of methods to coerce or intimidate Russian men into “volunteering” or “clarifying their data” - likely to support targeted recruitment campaigns or future covert mobilization.[47] Russian opposition news outlet Mediazona reported that Moscow City Disinfection Center stations told their employees that unspecified authorities gave the Moscow City Disinfection Center a recruitment quota of 100 men from each of the city’s 11 stations. Disinfection stations with fewer than 100 male employees reportedly encouraged their workers to persuade their acquaintances and friends and give information on male connections to their employer.[48]
Russian authorities work to protect key specialists and insulate public servants from service on the front lines despite major personnel needs on the front lines. The Russian Ministry of Labor approved on March 24 a list of 149 professions – including 64 working professions and 65 civil servant positions –eligible for alternative civilian service during mobilization.[49]
Russian authorities continue to crack down harshly on limited domestic resistance to the war in Ukraine and mobilization. Russian independent media outlet OVD News reported on March 23 that Russian security services detained a student on suspicion of committing an arson attack on a building housing a military registration and enlistment office in Leningrad Oblast.[50] OVD News also noted on March 23 that the Makhachkala, Republic of Dagestan district court sentenced a participant in September protests against mobilization to two years imprisonment.[51] OVD News cited a Russian human rights group “Zone of Solidarity” on March 23 report that a pre-trial detention center holding a Novosibirsk resident falsely accused of committing arson against a military registration office used a series of physical and psychological pressures to debase the detainee.[52] Russian news source People of Baikal claimed on March 22 that Russian authorities twice visited its editor and attempted to silence People of Baikal’s coverage of repeated complaints about mobilization conditions from soldiers in Regiment 1439.[53] A regional branch of Radio Liberty reported on March 23 that a Tartarstan military commissariat fined a Bashkirian company 50,000 rubles ($647) for advertising services aiding men in avoiding mobilization.[54]
Russian authorities continue use prosecution to deter deserters. Russian human rights activist Pavel Chikov stated on March 23 that Russian courts are considering around 500 cases of desertion.[55] Chikov critiqued the Russian Supreme Court’s draft resolution which would greatly expand what qualifies as desertion or a “crime against military service,” on which ISW reported on March 21.[56] A regional branch of Radio Liberty reported on March 23 that Russian authorities suspended the five-year sentence of a deserter from Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Khabarovsk Krai in favor of remobilizing the man.[57] Independent Russian news outlet Meduza amplified a report on March 20 that Russian authorities sentenced a major in the Federal Protective Service to 6.5 years in a penal colony and stripped him of his rank for allegedly fleeing to Kazakhstan after the start of mobilization.[58]
www.understandingwar.org/...
[END]
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[1] Url:
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