Russia managed to break through a key Ukrainian defense line in the east of the country, seizing a strategic area for its plan to conquer the region known as the Donbass. But progress is slow, highlighting Moscow’s difficulties and leaving the card of total mobilization on Vladimir Putin’s table.
The attacks in the area around the town of Popasna had started a month ago. It is central to the presumed move to encircle Ukrainian troops defending areas not occupied by pro-Russian separatists since 2014 in Donbass — now concentrated in Donetsk province.
Popasna, in neighboring Lugansk province, was “swept away by nationalists” on Tuesday, according to the Russian Defense Ministry, which counted 120 dead in the process. Russian and rebel forces “broke through deep enemy defenses and reached the administrative border of the Lugansk People’s Republic,” the ministry said.
The chatter is symbolic: the initial objective of the war was the “protection of Donbass”, composed in Moscow’s view of the two self-proclaimed Russian republics, Lugansk and Donetsk. There are few areas left to be taken in the first, but the second, richer and more important, has its center to the west dominated by the Kiev Army.
There is no independent confirmation of the data, but the advance itself has been attested by the Ukrainian government of the Lugansk region.
The battle for Donbass, which began on April 18, may or may not give the Kremlin a reason to declare victory. After failing to overthrow the Kiev government with an attack that seemed overwhelming on several fronts, the Russians had to regroup in the east for lack of available forces. In addition, they declared restoring the Donbass borders as Russian as the objective of the action.
The region taken along the border is strategic for a circular attack on Ukrainian troops, attacking or surrounding the city of Kramatorsk, which serves as the seat of government for the Ukrainians in what was left of Donetsk province for them. It is located about 70 km northwest of Popasna.
The advance comes as Kievan forces appear to be holding the Russians to the north, around Kharkiv. Ukraine’s second largest city has not been taken over at any time, but it has suffered intense bombing since the beginning of the war.
If the region fell, Ukraine would hardly be able to defend its army from falling into a “melting pot” with attacks from three sides, given that the virtual takeover of Mariupol consolidated Russian rule in the south of the country.
Meanwhile, Russia continues a routine of renewed attacks on Odessa, Ukraine’s biggest port and key to the eventual conquest of the remaining Black Sea coast, which is otherwise largely blocked off to Kiev.
For now, Moscow is using precision missiles against the city, which helps keep Ukrainian forces on alert and away from their offensive in the east. Whether this will evolve into an amphibious and land-based attack, as many fear in Kiev, is open and seems to defy difficulties with Moscow personnel. Even in the south, already taken, an immediate offensive front has not yet formed, as many analysts had predicted.
The reason, which affects the entire Russian campaign, is the anemia of human resources. According to military observers in Moscow and the West, there are difficulties in replenishing forces in a battle of attrition that is more reminiscent of World War II than modern conflicts.
In theory, that would be worse news for Kiev, as the country has less than a third of the Russian population. But it has been fully mobilized since the beginning of the war, with all men aged between 18 and 60 forced to fight, and receiving an increasingly varied and effective flow of Western weapons for combat.
This led to pressure in Russian uniformed circles for Putin to declare war, and not just a “special military operation”, in order to be able to legally use conscripts and reservists. There are unreliable reports that Moscow is scraping by in regions such as its base in Syria and among mercenaries from the notorious Wagner Group, but even that would be irrelevant to a heavyweight boost.
There was an expectation that Putin might make such an announcement on Victory Over Nazi Germany Day in 1945, celebrated on Monday (9), but nothing happened. On the contrary, despite rhetorical repetition about what he sees as the West’s and Kiev’s fault for the war, the tone was measured — not even an air parade with aircraft associated with a Third World War took place.
The possibility of the mobilization happening, however, remains on the agenda. There are multiple stories circulating in Russia about state-owned companies hiring people or directing employees in the event that the Kremlin continues to deny.
In the West, UK and US officials continue to gloat over Russian efforts, with defense departments in both countries saying Putin’s progress is anemic and insufficient.
