war in Ukraine
ISW: Russian major offensive in Luhansk likely
Military medics place the body of a soldier killed in a skirmish in Kremenna in a body bag. photo
© Libkos/AP/dpa
Russia is concentrating its armed forces in the Luhansk region, while hardly any attacks have been registered in other areas. The US Institute for War Studies draws concrete conclusions from this.
According to the US Institute for War Studies (ISW), Russia’s strategic deployment of various armed forces points to a major offensive in the Luhansk region in the near future.
The presence of conventional forces along the front there, as well as the fact that only limited attacks are taking place on fronts in other areas, suggest that Russian forces are preparing for a “decisive effort” in Luhansk, the Washington-based think tank said in its latest report on Wednesday (local time).
A number of intelligence statements support this assessment. The isolated attacks elsewhere served to distract and disperse the Ukrainian forces.
The US institute described an attack along the axis between the towns of Swatowe and Kreminna as the most likely course of the Russian offensive. This attack was therefore supposed to advance through the major logistics centers of the cities of Luhansk and Starobilsk to the border of the administrative region, where it would eventually conquer the parts of the oblast that are still under Ukrainian control.
Russia may be hoping to launch further attacks into the Kharkiv region from the Swatove-Kreminna line and recapture critical terrain north of Donetsk. “However, it is extremely unlikely that Russian forces will be able to gain significant ground on this axis, even if they launch a successful attack in this sector,” the report said.