ISW: Battle of Bakhmut may severely degrade Wagner Group’s best forces

The Battle of Bakhmut may, in fact, severely degrade the Wagner Group’s best forces, depriving Russia of some of its most effective and most difficult-to-replace shock troops.

The Wagner attacks already culminated once, causing the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) to commit some of its elite airborne troops to the fight, the US-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported on March 6.

It may well culminate again before taking the city, once more forcing the Russian military to choose between abandoning the effort or throwing more high-quality troops into the battle.

The opportunity to damage the Wagner Group’s elite elements, along with other elite units if they are committed, in a defensive urban warfare setting where the attrition gradient strongly favours Ukraine is an attractive one.

Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin apparently fears that his forces are being expended in exactly this way. Prigozhin made a number of statements on March 5 and 6 that suggest that he fears that the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) is fighting the Battle of Bakhmut to the last Wagner fighter and exposing his forces to destruction, the ISW says.

Prigozhin later published a response to the Zelensky-Zaluzhnyi-Syrskyi meeting on March 6 and claimed that Ukraine has formed a number of offensive groups in Donetsk Oblast to “unblock” Wagner’s blockade of Bakhmut and that he has been “raising the alarm” to call for ammunition and reinforcements for Wagner.

Prigozhin claimed that if Wagner does not receive needed ammunition and reinforcements and the blockade of Bakhmut breaks, all is essentially lost and that he will stay with Wagner to the end.

More importantly, it shows that he sees his elite forces to be in grave danger, the report added.

Key Takeaways

- Ukrainian authorities indicated that Ukraine will continue to defend Bakhmut for now.

- The Kremlin is returning to its previously unsuccessful volunteer recruitment and crypto-mobilization campaigns to avoid calling the second mobilization wave. The return of the voluntary recruitment and crypto-mobilization campaigns likely indicates that the Kremlin will not launch another mobilization wave at least before the summer of 2023 due to the spring conscription cycle on April 1.

- A reportedly captured Russian military manual suggests that Russian forces intend to use the newly created “assault detachment” elements in urban warfare.

- Russian forces utilized a new type of guided aerial bomb against Ukrainian targets amid continued precision missile shortages.

- Russian forces continued to conduct ground attacks northwest of Svatove and near Kreminna.

- Russian forces secured territorial gains in Bakhmut but have not yet encircled the city or forced Ukrainian forces to withdraw.

- Russian forces continued to conduct ground attacks near Avdiivka and west of Donetsk City.

- Russian forces continue struggling to maintain fire control over the Dnipro River Delta in Kherson Oblast.

- Russian military command is failing to properly equip its forces despite forces increasingly conducting close combat in Ukraine.

- Ukrainian officials reported on alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine.