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Russian troops are slowly closing in around Bakhmut, one of the cities still in Ukrainian hands in the Donbass, in a campaign with the feared Wagner mercenary group in the lead. Meanwhile, in Kherson, Kremlin-imposed officials signaled on October 28 that they have concluded “evacuations” of civilians, as they prepare for the major kyiv counter-offensive.
Russian hope to show progress on the ground is woven around Bakhmut, as the battle for Kherson looms.
The invading troops shell with artillery and are slowly approaching in the direction of Bakhmut, the Ukrainian Army said.
kyiv fires mortars and heavy artillery to repel Russian forces less than five kilometers away, according to the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank.
The crusade through Bakhmut, in the east of the attacked country, is crucial for the invading troops since it would mean breaking the supply lines of the Ukrainian Army, in the province of Donetsk, and would open a route with which the Russian military would advance towards Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, key Ukrainian strongholds in that area of the country.
While pro-Russian separatists have controlled parts of Donetsk and neighboring Lugansk province since 2014 – both of which belong to the larger Donbass region – Bakhmut is one of the few towns in that oblast still in the hands of Ukrainian authorities.
Russia has pounded Bakhmut with rockets for more than five months, but kyiv remains in control there after eight months of war and despite the Vladimir Putin administration’s goal of capturing all of Donbass, which borders Russia.
In an effort to wrest control of the town, Moscow has put its feared group of Wagner mercenaries in charge of this operation. A private military network that human rights organizations have denounced for its atrocities committed in countries like Mali and Syria.
So far, it is unclear whether those soldiers have made any tangible gains on the Ukrainian ground.
“We are seeing a situation where the Wagner Group is quite effective at creating terror among local residents, but much less effective at capturing and holding territory (…) At best, they are gaining 1 kilometer (0.6 miles ) per week to Bakhmut,” said Samuel Ramani, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based defense and security think tank.
Experts also stress that the Kremlin needs a victory in Bakhmut due to the significant setbacks suffered by its troops in the last two months.
“Russia suffers defeats across the board… They need the lens of some kind of offensive victory to appease critics at home and show the Russian public that this war is going as planned,” Ramani explained.
The city has been without electricity or water for a month, a greater impact as winter approaches.
“We hoped that this (war) would end or that we would have conditions that would allow us to live. But since last month, the conditions have been terrible,” said Leonid Tarasov, a local resident.
Bakhmut remains the next target for the Russians in their slow advance through the Donetsk region since seizing the key industrial cities of Lysychansk and Severodonetsk in June and July. The neighboring town of Soledar, to the north, is also under the Kremlin’s sights.
Russia Says Kherson ‘Evacuations’ Ended, While A Cruel Battle Awaits
Russian-imposed authorities in southern Ukraine have reported that evacuations of civilians from the Kherson region have been completed.
A week ago, the Kremlin said it expected to move between 50,000 and 60,000 people to the neighboring region of Crimea, annexed by Moscow in 2014, or to Russian territory.
An operation that kyiv denounces as “deportations” and forced transfers, for which it repeatedly asked the inhabitants to ignore the call of the Russians.
“The work to organize residents leaving the left side of the Dnipro (river) to safe regions of Russia has been completed,” said Sergei Aksyonov, the governor appointed by Vladimir Putin’s government.
Russia terminates the transfer of civilians when it prepares for the offensive in Kherson, before the approach of the Ukrainian Army that seeks to recover that territory, one of the first seized by the invading troops in the first days of the war.
kyiv warned on Thursday, October 27, that Moscow is regrouping and is preparing to fight “the mother of all battles” there.
The UK Ministry of Defense, which monitors the conflict, reported Friday that Russia has probably reinforced its troops there with “mobilized reservists” west of the Dnieper River.
The latest daily update from British intelligence indicated that even with Russia consolidating its defensive lines, its operations would remain vulnerable. They say that for the past six weeks, Moscow’s ground forces have moved into a “defensive posture” on the front line, probably because they are “severely understaffed” and “poorly trained.”
However, kyiv emphasized that “the toughest of battles” are expected there.
With Reuters and AP
