ISW Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, March 11, 2023

Key Takeaways

• Russian forces did not make any confirmed advances within Bakhmut on March 11.
• Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova confirmed that there is infighting in the Kremlin inner circle, that the Kremlin has ceded centralized control over the Russian information space, and implicitly that Russian President Vladimir Putin cannot fix it.
• Wagner financier Yevgeny Prigozhin said that he would transform the Wagner Group into a hardline ideological elite parallel military organization after the Battle of Bakhmut.
• Ukrainian sources report that Ukrainian forces advanced toward Svatove.
• Russian forces continue to establish fortifications in Zaporizhia Oblast.
• Russian mobilized soldiers continue to publicize complaints that commanders treat them poorly and used them as expendable manpower to patch holes in existent formations.
• Russian occupation officials use children’s healthcare to generate dependency on the Russian healthcare system.
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Authors: Riley Bailey, Karolina Hird, George Barros, Nicole Wolkov, Angela Howard, and Frederick W. Kagan

See full report here.