Did the Russian army have to change their plans? Is Moscow downshifting on its goals in Ukraine?
It may be too early to understand this, but there are expressions in Russia’s statements that can be attributed to this.
General Sergey Rudskoy, Head of the Main Operations Department of the Russian General Staff, said that the first phase of the invasion, which they called a “special military operation”, has concluded and that from now on, Russia will “focus on the complete liberation of Donbas”.
That means sending more troops to Donetsk and Luhansk, two separatist regions that have declared their independence and recognized by Russia, and focus on seizing areas controlled by the Ukrainian government in those regions.
Russia’s progress in the rest of Ukraine is frozen. It is reported that the Russian army was repulsed in some places north of Kiev, and they took a defensive position and dug trenches to avoid further retreat.
It may be premature to say that Russia has given up on its goal of capturing Kiev, but Western officials say Russia has been failing in a row.
Authorities report that the number of generals that Russia lost in the war increased to seven on Friday and that morale in some units collapsed.
They believe that this statement by General Rudskoy means that Moscow has accepted the failure of the strategy it had set before the war.
“Russia has realized that it cannot wage war on more than one front at the same time,” said one official I spoke with.
He also says that Russia has formed about 10 new teams and divisions, and that they are on their way to Donbas.
Even before the war broke out, Western officials were worried that Russia was encircling the Joint Operations Forces (JSF), Ukraine’s best-fighting troops, which had been fighting on the front in the Donbas for years.
Withdrawal from the Kyiv periphery may not mean downsizing
Russia can advance in Donetsk and Luhansk with a new attack and send new soldiers to this region via Kharkov and Izyum.
If they also capture Mariupol on the Sea of Azov, they can establish the land link between Crimea and Donbas.
Thus, the Russian forces in Mariupol could also be transferred to Donetsk and Luhansk, which formed the Donbas.
But some of these goals do not seem easy to achieve.
The defenders of Mariupol put up a fierce resistance.
But if Russia has decided to achieve its goals sequentially and not simultaneously, it can concentrate its forces accordingly. This includes the air force.
In that case, the Ukrainian Army, however disciplined and motivated, will need all kinds of help to resist such pressure.
“In this case, we will hope that the weapons supplied by the West will make a great contribution to the Ukrainian army,” says one Western official.
Even if Russia concentrates on the Donbas in the coming days, this may not mean that it has given up on its larger goals.
“We don’t think there has been a change in attitude about the entire occupation,” says a senior US defense official.