Ukraine likely faces the approaching loss of a key eastern town to Russia, one of the country’s top intelligence officials said.
“Not today or tomorrow, of course, but all depending on our reserves and supplies,” Major-General Vadym Skibitsky, the deputy head of military intelligence, told The Economist.
Much of the town in question, Chasiv Yar, is little more than rubble after more than a year of bombardment.
But its natural hilltop position has helped it serve as a staging ground for Ukrainian skirmishes on the Russian advance, helping block Russia’s path to the last free cities of the Donetsk region.
Ukraine Patrol Police via AP Photo
Chasiv Yar sits just to the west of Bakhmut, the doomed city that was pounded to nothing over almost a year of brutal siege until it finally fell in May 2023.
Bakhmut was considered of minimal strategic value.
By contrast, Chasiv Yar’s high ground and proximity to important cities means huge potential gains for Russia.
The town, formerly of about 13,000 people, is the “key” that will “open the gate for exhaustive and long-lasting battles,” military analyst Serhiy Hrabsky recently told The New York Times.
Its capture would put in reach of Russian forces the headquarters of Ukraine’s eastern command, Kramatorsk, and the key supply hub of Kostiantynivka — both of which contain large civilian populations, the outlet reported.
As of last week, Russia had around 20,000-25,000 soldiers clustered around the assault on Chasiv Yar, the paper reported.
A year after the fall of Bakhmut, capturing all of the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions is still likely Russian President Vladimir Putin’s most immediate goal, Skibitsky told The Economist.
Libkos/Getty Images
And the line is buckling.
While Chasiv Yar holds, Russia has carved a salient about 25 miles to the southwest in the village of Ocheretyne.
Russia is throwing “everything” at trying to widen the breach there, Skibitsky said.
That’s in addition to the loss of Avdiivka in February, a few miles further south of Chasiv Yar, which has allowed Russian forces to creep further west.
Pressure is likely to build to boiling point in the coming days, Skibitsky said.
Putin is probably seeking a victory he can trumpet on May 9, Russia’s all-important Victory Day military celebration.
For last year’s event, Ukrainian forces strained every nerve to hold onto Bakhmut through that date, while Russia redoubled its “human wave” and artillery attacks, soldiers there told Business Insider.
Soldiers in Chasiv Yar may well face the same onslaught in the coming days. If they hold on, another key date is Putin’s planned visit to Beijing a week later, The Economist reported.
“Our problem is very simple: we have no weapons,” Skibitsky said.
The Pentagon said some of its aid could arrive in Ukraine “within days” of the recent aid bill. But, The Economist reported, in reality much of it could take weeks to reach the front line.
