Ukraine Fights Stubborn Bakhmut Holding Action As It Prepares Offensive

Ukraine is fighting a stubborn holding action in Bakhmut as its three new army corps, armed with NATO weapons and European-trained troops, prepare to go on the offensive against an increasingly depleted Russian forces. JL  

Matthew Bigg reports in the New York Times:

Fierce battles are raging in the center of Bakhmut. Snipers and drones have played a significant role in the battle. Ukraine’s special operations service said  snipers had killed 10 Russian soldiers in Bakhmut in the last few days. The commander of Ukraine’s forces said last month that the situation in Bakhmut could be stabilized, suggesting increasing confidence in Kyiv’s ability to retain control. But the Wagner paramilitary group and Russia’s regular forces have both shifted their tactics. “Rather than trying to encircle Ukrainian troops, they have focused on pushing beyond Bakhmut to the northwest."

Fierce battles are raging in the center of the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, a Ukrainian commander said on Wednesday as he vowed to defend the ruined city amid increasing signs that Russia is edging forward in its campaign for control of a place that has become the focal point of fighting on the war’s eastern front.

The commander of the Terra aerial reconnaissance unit, Mykola Volokhov, said that fighting was taking place near the City Council building, where Russian forces said this week that they had raised a flag. Ukrainian officials denied that Russia controlled Bakhmut, but the flag indicated that Moscow’s forces, who control the portion of the city east of the Bakhmutka River, were slowly advancing west of the river.

“We are holding on, and we will continue to defend Bakhmut,” Mr. Volokhov said on Ukrainian television.

The fighting in and around Bakhmut, which has been raging since the summer, has been among the fiercest and most lethal of the war, with tens of thousands of killed and wounded, according to Western governments. Although the city’s strategic significance is debatable, each side has justified its campaign by saying it is weakening the other’s army with high casualties.

In the latest indication of those losses, Ukraine’s special operations service said on Wednesday that snipers had killed 10 Russian soldiers in Bakhmut in the last few days. It posted grainy video on the Telegram social messaging app of the shootings, set against background music. It was not possible to independently verify the video or the report, although snipers and drones have played a significant role in the battle.

The commander of Ukraine’s forces, Gen. Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, said last month that the situation in Bakhmut could be stabilized, suggesting increasing confidence in Kyiv’s ability to retain control. But the Wagner paramilitary group — which has spearheaded much of the fighting in Bakhmut — and Russia’s regular forces have both shifted their tactics, according to Michael Kofman, the director of Russian studies at CNA, a research institute in Arlington, Va.

Moscow has been “steadily gaining territory in the north and east and south of the city, and they seem to have crossed the river itself,” he said on the “War on the Rocks” podcast. “Rather than trying to completely encircle Ukrainian troops, they have instead focused on pushing beyond Bakhmut to the northwest of the city, and they are also trying to push Ukraine out of the city.”