Media: In Bakhmut Russia makes only minor tactical gain at cost of huge personnel losses

“The risk for Russia, according to a European defense official, is that in Bakhmut it makes only a minor tactical gain at the cost of huge personnel losses,” reads the article by Mark Champion and Alberto Nardelli titled “Ukraine’s Battlefields Are Freezing. Here’s What That Means for the War” published on Bloomberg, Report informs.

“Russian forces are trying to take Bakhmut and nearby Soledar, while Ukrainian troops are attacking Kreminna and Svatove; all are small-to-mid-sized towns in the eastern Donbas region that Russia claims to have annexed, but only partially occupies,” Bloomberg said.

According to the article, taking Svatove would allow Ukraine to cut a key Russian logistics route for operations in the Donbas region: “Newly announced supplies of armored fighting vehicles from the US, Germany and France, as well as growing signs that NATO standard tanks could follow, would better equip Ukraine for a fresh offensive. Officials in Kyiv, meanwhile, have expressed concern over the possibility of a renewed Russian attack from Belarus, just 150 km north of Ukraine’s capital. Russia’s President Vladimir Putin annexed the Crimean peninsula in 2014, turning it since into a support base for his forces in the rest of occupied Ukraine. Some military analysts have expressed skepticism at Ukraine’s capacity to retake it.”

According to analysts, the Bakhmut fighting is likely to remain intense regardless of weather: “While Bakhmut has relatively small strategic significance, Russian commanders appear determined to take it regardless of cost.”