Russia’s goal is to weaken Ukraine as much as possible. The next stage of military aggression, which will focus on the Donbass, is likely to last several months, the White House noted.
Russia is reviewing its military objectives and preparing for a new phase of the war that could last several months or longer. This was stated by US national security adviser Jake Sullivan at a briefing on April 4.
According to him, the Russian Federation is regrouping its forces in order to focus offensive operations in the Donbas and parts of southern Ukraine.
“All indications are that Russia will seek to surround and overwhelm Ukrainian forces in eastern Ukraine…. Russian forces are already well on their way of retreating from Kyiv to Belarus as Russia likely prepares to deploy dozens of additional battalion tactical groups, constituting tens of thousands of soldiers, to the frontline in Ukraine’s east,” said the advisor.
The US predicts that the Russian Federation will focus on trying to seize the wider borders of the Lugansk and Donetsk regions in order to “mask” previous military failures. In addition, Moscow is expected to expand its “military power on fewer lines of attack” beyond the Lugansk and Donetsk regions.
“In the south, we also expect that Russian military forces will do what they can to try to hold the city of Kherson, to enable their control of the waterflow to Crimea, and try to block Mykolaiv so that Ukrainian forces cannot proceed to retake Kherson. In the north, Russia will likely keep pressure on Kharkiv,” Sullivan said.
He added that during the renewed Russian ground offensive in the east, air and missile strikes on the rest of Ukraine are likely to continue.
“Russia’s goal, in the end, is to weaken Ukraine as much as possible…. The next stage of this conflict may very well be protracted. We should be under no illusions that Russia will adjust its tactics, which have included and will likely continue to include wanton and brazen attacks on civilian targets,” the adviser to the American leader said.
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