Russian Forces Push Into Donbas Town Where Dam Was Blown Up

Russian forces advanced between one and two kilometers in waves of assaults against battered Ukrainian troops in the eastern Donbas sector, as a long-running Kremlin offensive in east Ukraine appeared to pick up pace on Wednesday.

Unofficial Russian sources reported Kremlin forces had taken control of the village of Novoselydivka and pushed troops into the eastern districts of Kurakhove, the regional industrial center, where heavy combat was in progress.

Ukrainian milbloggers confirmed a triple-pronged wave of Russian assaults had gained significant ground around the town, with a pace of advance pointing toward collapsing Ukrainian defenses in some sectors.

The pro-Ukrainian DeepState combat situation tracking group reported Russian troops in the past 24 hours had reached and launched house-to-house assaults in the village of Novoselydivka to the north of Kurakhove, and the village of Dalnye to the south.

Both DeepState and the pro-Russian milblogger Mikhail Zvinchuk reported fighting in Kurakhove was centered on the buildings lining Zaporizky Prospekt, the main road leading east from the town.

A Tuesday evening situation update published by the Ukraine Army General Staff said that Ukrainian forces engaged 41 separate Russian attacks in the Kurakhove sector, of which 17 had been “repelled” by the end of the day. That statement confirmed fighting in progress in Dalnye and Novoselydivka.

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Multiple Russian air strikes hit buildings in Kurakhove, that official report said. There was no mention of Russian troops having advanced to positions inside the town, or ground combat there.

Were Kremlin forces to gain control or cross the 12-kilometer front of their latest ground gains centered around Kurakhove town, it would be a significant local victory and a sign of accelerating offensive power for the Russian military. Past attacks by Kremlin troops in east Ukraine have rarely managed advances greater than a single farm field in a day, often at the price of heavy casualties.

Information feeds from Ukraine’s 46th Air Assault Brigade, a combat formation deployed to the Kurakhove sector, reported its FPV drones and artillery had destroyed at least 10 Russian armored vehicles in fighting in and around the town, and that pilots were systematically hunting down Russian infantry.

Undated video published by the 46th, in late 2022 one of the first Ukrainian combat brigades to be issued Western heavy weapons, showed accurate artillery strikes interdicting a five-vehicle Russian armored column equipped with BMP infantry fighting vehicles.

Geolocated video showed a Russian armored infantry column rolling through a gap in a Ukrainian dragon’s tooth anti-tank barrier underneath shell strikes. Tanks and mine-clearing vehicles lead the column. In some images, kamikaze drones fly into gaps in protective anti-drone armor installed on the BMPs to detonate.

Other video showed Russian foot soldiers chased down by FPV drones in an open field, or attacked by an FPV drone after taking cover in a bunker.

A Wednesday statement from the 46th said fighting was continuing and described the combat situation in the sector as “complicated.” The DeepState report said of the battles: “It has not been possible to liquidate all occupiers [Russian troops] from the town of Kurakhove, the situation there is still difficult.”

An industrial center and site of a massive Soviet-era coal-fired power plant, Kurakhove reportedly is a priority objective for Russia’s Group of Forces East. Ukrainian defenses have increasingly struggled to contain relentless Russian attacks, whose commanders seem willing to accept heavy casualties for small ground gains.

Relentless attacks since early 2024 have gradually pushed Russian troops into positions encircling Kurakhove from three sides. On Wednesday, Zvinchuk, citing battle reports, said that the latest Kremlin advances had put the Ukrainian army’s main supply route into and out of Kurakhove – the N15 highway – under Russian observation and direct fire.

Ukrainian media on Tuesday widely accused Russian air strike planners for a pair of explosions hitting and breaching a dam to the east of Kurakhove, used in peacetime for flood control. However, video of the strikes seemed to show a pair of detonations similar to line charges setting off explosives buried in road tarmac crossing the dam, implying Ukrainian combat engineers may have set off the blast.

Drone images published by the Kremlin-friendly milblogger Boris Rozhin showed a widening flood of water pouring past a breach in Kurakhove dam. He said Ukrainian combat engineers blew a hole to flood the surrounding countryside in a bid to slow advancing Russian troops.

Flooding from the dam break could possibly benefit, or harm operations on both sides. Combined with soft ground in the region common in Donbas in November, high water could force Ukrainian troops to the east of the breach to stay on roads and become easy targets were they to retreat. But at the same time, the high water would slow down Russian attempts to advance off-road on a broad front.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in a Monday evening national TV address on the situation of the front singled out Kurakhove as a key sector and scene of very heavy fighting. He said that Ukraine’s current main effort, an invasion of Russia’s Kursk region, had reduced the Kremlin’s ability to take more territory in Ukraine.