(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Ukraine Invasion Day 428: is it now a breakable stalemate [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-04-26 "KIDS" in Mariupol - Google maps has just updated its satellite images of Mariupol. Up until now we haven't been able to see the full scale of destruction in the city that became one of the worst tragedies since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Is it still about ammo supplies this close to the counter-offense, and do the Russians think that the Kharkiv offensive will repeat itself. AFTER a Russian winter offensive that failed to make many gains, the world is watching to see how the Ukrainian military strikes back and whether it can shake the stalemate that now characterizes the war in its country. Most agree that a long-anticipated spring counteroffensive is in the offing, even as many Ukrainian soldiers remain bogged down in hellish Bakhmut. But does a depleted Ukrainian force that desperately needs more ammunition have a chance of making significant gains? Does Ukraine actually have the capability to do that right now? That is very difficult to assess. There’s a very limited data set to work with. I’ve been to Ukraine various times, and I’ve only overseen certain sectors of the front. I was not able to talk to every single brigade commander, every single officer. You get different pictures at the tactical level of what’s really happening. But what I’ve not seen, for example, is a sustained campaign by the Ukrainians to at least attempt to put the Russians on the defensive along the front line. We saw something to that effect leading up to the Kharkiv offensive, where for months the Ukrainians conducted a sustained strike campaign. And we haven’t really seen that over the last couple of weeks. When I was in Ukraine last time, in March, there seemed to have been a real shortage of ammo. Both sides seemed to be rationing ammunition. I think the ammunition problem will be solved for the Ukrainian side before this offensive kicks off. The Ukrainians are likely stockpiling. www.cnas.org/... x "It’s all relative in terms of military power. You’re only as good as your enemy is or as bad as your enemy is," @HoansSolo tells @NYMag. Read more: https://t.co/ThIIVBF8KI — CNAS (@CNASdc) April 26, 2023 Putin’s position is less stable than it was a year ago, largely because the war with Ukraine is not going well for Russia. Criticism of the Russian military’s performance from hawkish officials, led by Wagner chief Prigozhin, indicates serious fissures among the elite. Putin’s recent demotion of Surovikin and appointment of Gerasimov in his place to take charge of operations in Ukraine also suggests increasing rivalries among the top military brass. Public opinion remains largely favorable to the war, and Putin’s own position has not been publicly challenged. But if Russia is not able to retake territory from the Ukrainians, there will be increasing questioning of Putin’s competence as a leader. www.cnas.org/... Russia appears to be continuing a deliberate depopulation campaign in occupied areas of Ukraine in order to facilitate the repopulation of Ukrainian territories with Russians. Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar stated on April 26 that Russia is trying to change the ethnic composition of Ukraine by actively conducting a large-scale resettlement of people mainly from poorer and remote regions of Russia into Ukraine.[1] Malyar noted that the most intensive efforts are ongoing in occupied Luhansk Oblast and remarked that Russia is also deporting Ukrainians and forcibly resettling them in Russia.[2] ISW previously reported on specific instances of Russian authorities overseeing the depopulation and repopulation of areas of occupied Ukraine, particularly in occupied Kherson Oblast over the course of 2022. Ukrainian sources remarked in October 2022 that Russian authorities in then-occupied parts of Kherson Oblast deported large groups of Ukrainian residents to Russia under the guise of humanitarian evacuations and then repopulated their homes with Russian soldiers.[3] Russia may hope to import Russians to fill depopulated areas of Ukraine in order to further integrate occupied areas into Russian socially, administratively, politically, and economically, thereby complicating conditions for the reintegration of these territories into Ukraine. ISW has previously assessed that such depopulation and repopulation campaigns may amount to a deliberate ethnic cleansing effort and apparent violation of the Geneva Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.[4] www.understandingwar.org/... Comments made by Russian officials and prominent voices in the Russian information space continue to highlight a pervasive anxiety over potential Ukrainian counteroffensive actions. Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin remarked on April 26 that as soon as weather conditions improve in Bakhmut, Ukraine will launch a counteroffensive, which may coincide with Russia’s May 9 Victory Day holiday (the commemoration of Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in 1945).[14] A prominent Russian milblogger insinuated that Ukraine may be planning counteroffensive actions in order to ruin May 9 celebrations in Russia.[15] The invocations of May 9 suggest that the Russian information space continues to place symbolic importance on dates associated with Russia’s Great Patriotic War, which continues to shape discourse on the prospects of the war. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated during a press conference in New York on April 25 that discussions about the potential for negotiations after a successful Ukrainian counteroffensive are ”schizophrenic.”[16] Increasingly despondent and panicked rhetoric emanating from prominent information space figures suggests that the Russian information space has not yet settled on a line about how to address significant and growing concerns about the near future. www.understandingwar.org/... China’s president, Xi Jinping, spoke to Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, on Wednesday for the first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Kyiv had publicly sought such talks for months. Zelenskiy described the hour’s phone call as “long and meaningful”. Xi told Zelenskiy that China would send special representatives to Ukraine and hold talks with all parties seeking peace, Chinese state media reported. The White House welcomed the phone call, but said it was too soon to tell whether it would lead to a peace deal. Russia’s envoy to the UN in Geneva said no real progress had been achieved in resolving issues raised by Moscow over the Black Sea grain deal, which is due to expire next month. British fighter jets helped in a joint NATO response to intercept three Russian planes, including two SU-27 fighter jets, over the Baltic Sea on Wednesday. The head of Russia’s private Wagner militia said Ukraine was preparing for an “inevitable” counter-offensive and was sending well-prepared units to the devastated eastern city of Bakhmut, for many months the focal point of fighting. The Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny says he is being investigated on terrorism charges that could see him sentenced to 30 years in prison, Reuters has reported. The Kremlin critic is serving sentences totalling 11 and a half years on charges including fraud and contempt of court, which human rights groups say were made up to silence him. Italy has said it wants to play a major role in the reconstruction of Ukraine and urged EU bodies to back the rebuilding. Italy’s president, Sergio Mattarella, met the Ukrainian prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, on Wednesday. A Ukrainian reporter working as a fixer for Italy’s daily newspaper Repubblica was shot dead by snipers in Kherson, while his Italian colleague was wounded, the newspaper said. “Our correspondent Corrado Zunino and his fixer Bogdan Bitik were victims of an ambush by Russian snipers today on the outskirts of Kherson, in southern Ukraine.” www.theguardian.com/… x Numerous outlets continue to call WW3-4 'Putin's War in the Ukraine'. All of it. https://t.co/UhiAdScZx3 — United Scapegoats of America (@TheyScapegoatU) April 26, 2023 A defeated Russia is not in China’s interest. The Kremlin is Beijing’s most important partner in its opposition to the U.S.-led international order. Despite their many differences, China and Russia have joined forces to advance an alternative order with its own rules of war and peace, its own financial centers, and its own multilateral institutions. ...A Russian humiliation in Ukraine would undermine this narrative, giving the United States greater latitude to focus its energies and resources on competing with China. To prevent this outcome, China could opt to throw Russia a lifeline beyond economic and moral support and supply its partner with lethal military aid. It could do so to prolong the war, to stave off a Russian defeat, or to speed some kind of Russian victory. Chinese aid could be covert—designed, that is, not to be discovered by U.S. intelligence. Indeed, China’s delivery to Russia of goods such as so-called hunting rifles, which have both civilian and military uses, arguably already constitutes such support. Or Beijing’s involvement could be overt. The public announcement of weapons deliveries would signal a formal alliance with Russia, and China’s entry into the war would open a new chapter in international affairs, turning the conflict in Ukraine into a truly global one and inaugurating a far more adversarial relationship between China and the West. www.foreignaffairs.com/... x If anyone is still wondering why the Baltic States don't trust China to "broker peace in Ukraine", here's a Chinese ambassador arguing that Crimea is Russian and our countries' borders have no legal basis. pic.twitter.com/JaloJnSEx3 — Gabrielius Landsbergis🇱🇹 (@GLandsbergis) April 22, 2023 Western leaders never pledged not to enlarge NATO, a point that several analysts have demonstrated. Mark Kramer explored the question in detail in a 2009 article in The Washington Quarterly . He drew on declassified American, German and Soviet records to make his case and noted that, in discussions on German reunification in the two-plus-four format (the two Germanys plus the United States, Soviet Union, Britain and France), the Soviets never raised the question of NATO enlargement other than how it might apply in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR) www.brookings.edu/... Key Takeaways Russia appears to be continuing a deliberate depopulation campaign in occupied areas of Ukraine in order to facilitate the repopulation of Ukrainian territories with Russians. Competition among Russian private military companies (PMCs) is likely increasing in Bakhmut. The Kremlin continues measures to codify conditions for domestic repression. Comments made by Russian officials and prominent voices in the Russian information space continue to highlight a pervasive anxiety over potential Ukrainian counteroffensive actions. Chinese President Xi Jinping explicitly recognized Ukraine’s sovereignty and independence, stating that mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity are foundational to Ukrainian-Chinese relations in a conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The Kremlin is likely attempting to reassure Armenia that it is a reliable partner despite the fact that the war in Ukraine is limiting Russia’s ability to play a larger role in mediating the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The Kremlin may attempt to use conscripts to maintain peacekeeping operations in Nagorno Karabakh and preserve relations with Armenia and other Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) member states. Ukrainian sources reported that Russian forces did not conduct any offensive operations along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line. Russian forces made gains within Bakhmut and north of Avdiivka. Russian milbloggers continue to argue amongst themselves about Ukrainian activity along the Dnipro River in Kherson Oblast. Russian authorities have started sending military registration summonses that include threats of “restrictive measures.” Russian sources claimed that the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) prevented an attempted attack in Crimea. www.understandingwar.org/... Public domain satellite images show defensive belts, built not just on the front line blocking the most likely directions for initial Ukrainian assaults, but in hundreds of secondary fighting positions reaching dozens of kilometers into the Russian rear area. This is particularly true along major highways leading from Ukrainian army-controlled territory in the Zaporizhia and Kherson sectors in the direction of the widely-predicted ultimate objective of the attack - Russian-occupied Crimea. Anybody wondering how repressive regimes find the ‘judges’, ‘prosecutors’ and ‘police’ needed for politically-motivated arrests and trials, should look to Crimea under Russian occupation. Although Moscow sent in Viktor Palagin and other Russians with a track record in repression to take up top posts in the FSB [security service], it also applied various ‘incentives’ to encourage Crimeans to switch allegiance. One of the most corrupting of such incentives is housing. While a sharp hike in property prices after Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea made it even harder for ordinary Crimeans to buy flats, many FSB officials and prosecutors got the chance of receiving quality accommodation at the taxpayers’ expense. In at very least one case, that of turncoat ‘chief prosecutor’ Natalya Poklonskaya, she has not relinquished this flat even though she is now an MP in Russia’s parliament. khpg.org/... Ukraine’s Armed Forces have received nearly all the military equipment they need for a successful counteroffensive, Supreme Allied Commander Europe, Gen. Christopher Cavoli, said during a U.S. House Armed Services Committee hearing on April 26. Cavoli stated that Ukraine and its Western allies calculated how much equipment Kyiv would require for the counteroffensive, after which Ukraine's partners began supplying it. The general said that over 98% of the promised combat vehicles had already arrived in Ukraine, and also acknowledged the "generosity" of allies in supplying tanks and armored combat vehicles. english.nv.ua/... x ⚡️ WAR IN #UKRAINE - APR 26 Removal of duplicates on both lists (-39 🇷🇺, -4 🇺🇦) List maintained by @Rebel44CZ VISUALLY CONFIRMED: 3.2x losses to date ➡ 2.8x since 🇺🇦 counteroffensive (Aug 29) ➡ 3.4x 30-day average ⬇ 📈 https://t.co/dgZhupi1s9 pic.twitter.com/HJJ6Vd2et8 — Ragnar Gudmundsson 🇮🇸🇺🇦 ragnarbjartur@masto.ai (@ragnarbjartur) April 26, 2023 Russian Main Effort – Eastern Ukraine Russian Subordinate Main Effort #1 – Luhansk Oblast (Russian objective: Capture the remainder of Luhansk Oblast and push westward into eastern Kharkiv Oblast and northern Donetsk Oblast) Ukrainian sources reported that Russian forces did not conduct any offensive operations along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line on April 26.[28] Ukrainian Eastern Grouping of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty reported that Russian forces have not conducted offensive operations along this sector of the front for “some time” but that Russian forces are continuing to conduct heavy indirect fire in this sector of the front.[29] A Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces conducted unsuccessful ground attacks near Makiivka (23km northwest of Kreminna), Nevske (19km northwest of Kreminna), Torske (16km west of Kreminna), and Bilohorivka (12km south of Kreminna).[30] Another Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces pushed back Ukrainian forces from positions on the eastern outskirts of Spirne (24km south of Kreminna) on Apri 25, although ISW assessed that Russian forces likely occupied these positions at an earlier date.[31] www.understandingwar.org/... www.understandingwar.org/... 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 making gains in Bakhmut as of April 26. Geolocated footage posted on April 26 shows that Russian troops have advanced to Persha Lisova Street in western Bakhmut (within a few blocks of the Yuvileina 00506 road that runs into Khromove).[34] Russian milbloggers additionally claimed that Wagner fighters reached the intersection of Tchaikovskyi and Yuvileina Streets, which would hypothetically allow them to advance up Yuvileina Street towards Khromove and cut remaining Ukrainian logistics lines into Bakhmut.[35] Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin denied these claims, however, and played down the significance of Wagner’s capture of that intersection, stating that Ukrainian forces are continuing to use roads under Wagner’s fire control anyways.[36] Russian milbloggers claimed that Wagner is continuing to fight in northern, western, and southern Bakhmut.[37] One Russian milblogger claimed that Wagner controls up to 85 percent of the city, which is consistent with ISW’s control of terrain calculations including territory covered by Russian claims.[38] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty stated that Russian and Ukrainian forces engaged in 17 combat clashes in the Bakhmut direction over the past day.[39] The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian troops conducted unsuccessful offensive actions northwest of Bakhmut near Orikhovo-Vasylivka (10km northwest) and Bohdanivka (6km northwest); west of Bakhmut near Ivanivske (5km west) and Khromove (3km west); and southwest of Bakhmut near Klishchiivka (7km southwest).[40] www.understandingwar.org/... www.understandingwar.org/... Russian Supporting Effort – Southern Axis (Russian objective: Maintain frontline positions and secure rear areas against Ukrainian strikes) Russian milbloggers continue to argue amongst themselves about Ukrainian activity along the Dnipro River in Kherson Oblast as of April 26. A prominent Russian milblogger claimed on April 25 that Ukrainian reconnaissance and river crossing activity is most prevalent on Velykiy Potemkin island (6km south of Kherson City), south of Kindyika (8km east of Kherson City), and west of Veletenske (18km southwest of Kherson City).[48] The Russian milblogger claimed that Russian forces struck Ukrainian positions on Velykiy Potemkin island as well as in coastal areas near Kindyika on April 25.[49] Another Russian milblogger amplified geolocated footage on April 25 of the ”Kherson” volunteer detachment on a section of the E58 highway south of the Antonivsky Bridge on an unspecified date and argued that reports about Ukrainian forces establishing positions on the east (left) bank are false.[50] This milblogger has previously reported demonstrably false information, and it is possible that he may have purposefully posted old footage of the area to refute reports about Ukrainian forces holding positions on the east (left) bank. ISW has not observed any new additional visual evidence to validate or confirm Russian claims about Ukrainian positions or activity on the east (left) bank of the Dnipro River in Kherson Oblast. ISW expanded Russian claims northward closer to the dacha area south of Antonivka (9km west of Kherson City) on the east (left) bank of the Dnipro River based on claims from the prominent milblogger. ISW has not observed visual evidence of Ukrainian forces operating south of the Antonivsky Bridge since April 22. www.understandingwar.org/... www.understandingwar.org/... x Hence, these missiles, according to Ukrainian SAM operators, have a reduced interception rate (50-60% instead of 80% usually). That said- something is better than nothing!https://t.co/GxktWjWRzY — 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) April 22, 2023 [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/26/2166072/-Ukraine-Invasion-Day-428-is-it-now-a-breakable-stalemate Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/