While seven civilians have been killed today in missile strikes on Lyiv, it may be a distraction from the primary area for future combat in the eastern part of Ukraine. Mariupol has not yet fallen even though a number of Ukrainian forces are surrounded in a small area of the Azovstal industrial sector, refusing to surrender. Today is the second day where no humanitarian corridors are available.
Ukrainian forces defied Russian demands to surrender in the key port city of Mariupol by a Sunday deadline, though the situation appeared bleak as forces remained holed up in the bombed-out city where tens of thousands of stranded civilians struggle to access basic necessities.
Analysts expect Russia to capture the devastated city soon while it refocuses its military might on Ukraine’s eastern region after failing to seize the capital, Kyiv.
The battle for control over eastern and southern cities is the latest stage in a war now in its eighth week, as Russia attempts to solidify its grip on an area that provides strategically important access points to the Black Sea and beyond. Ukrainian leaders, meanwhile, made pleas on Sunday news programs for additional U.S. support.
The officials said besieged cities including Mariupol remain under their control but described conditions as increasingly dire.
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Key Takeaways
- Russian forces likely captured the Port of Mariupol on April 16 despite Ukrainian General Staff denials.
- Russian forces likely seek to force the remaining defenders of the Azovstal factory to capitulate through overwhelming firepower to avoid costly clearing operations, but remaining Ukrainian defenders appear intent on staging a final stand.
- Evgeny Prigozhin, financier of the Wagner Group, is likely active on the ground in eastern Ukraine to coordinate Wagner Group recruitment and funding.
- Russian forces continued their build up around Izyum but did not conduct any offensive operations.
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Russian forces likely captured the Port of Mariupol on April 16 despite Ukrainian General Staff denials, reducing organized Ukrainian resistance in the city to the Azovstal factory in eastern Mariupol. Russian and DNR forces released footage on April 16 confirming their presence in several key locations in southwestern Mariupol, including the port itself. Isolated groups of Ukrainian troops may remain active in Mariupol outside of the Azovstal factory, but they will likely be cleared out by Russian forces in the coming days. Russian forces likely seek to force the remaining defenders of the Azovstal factory to capitulate through overwhelming firepower to avoid costly clearing operations, but remaining Ukrainian defenders appear intent on staging a final stand. Russian forces will likely complete the capture of Mariupol in the coming week, but final assaults will likely continue to cost them dearly.
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Subordinate main effort – Mariupol (Russian objective: Capture Mariupol and reduce the Ukrainian defenders)
Russian forces likely captured the Port of Mariupol on April 16 despite Ukrainian General Staff denials on April 17, and Russian forces have reduced Ukrainian positions in the city to the Azovstal factory and a few isolated pockets. Russian and DNR forces released footage on April 16 confirming their presence in several key locations in southwestern Mariupol – including the traffic control center of the port, the prosecutors building, and the Main Directorate of the National Police in Donetsk region – and have likely reduced the center of Ukrainian defense in southwestern Mariupol.[4] The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed on April 16 that Russian forces cleared the entirety of urban Mariupol and that “the remnants of the Ukrainian group are currently completely blocked on the territory of the Azovstal metallurgical plant."[5] Isolated groups of Ukrainian troops may remain active in Mariupol outside of the Azovstal factory, but they will likely be cleared out by Russian forces in the coming days and the Ukrainian General Staff’s claim at 6pm local time on April 17 that Ukrainian forces repelled a Russian assault on the port is likely false.[6]
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Russian forces continued to amass on the Izyum axis and in eastern Ukraine, increasingly including low-quality proxy conscripts, in parallel with continuous – and unsuccessful – small-scale attacks. Russian forces did not take any territory on the Izyum axis or in Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts in the past 24 hours. Russian forces deploying to eastern Ukraine reportedly continue to face significant morale and supply issues and appear unlikely to intend, or be able to, conduct a major offensive surge in the coming days.[1] Deputy Ukrainian Minister of Defense Anna Malyar stated on April 17 that the Russian military is in no hurry to launch an offensive in eastern Ukraine, having learned from their experience from Kyiv – but Russian forces continue localized attacks and are likely unable to amass the cohesive combat power necessary for a major breakthrough.[2]
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The reports of Ukrainian counterattacks yesterday show the total understanding of logistics and supply that the Ukrainian armed forces possess. Here is a map where the locations of two of the counterattacks are in red.
Ukrainians are attacking two ways, out of Kharkiv/Chuhuiv to cut Russian roads from the west and out of the south towards Borova to cut roads from the southeast. Here is a map of Borova move.
If the Ukrainians can hold, or even expand these attacks, basically the entire Russian force in Izyum, which was said to be up to 22 BTGs, is completely reliant on one road network to get everything it needs. I’ve used google maps to highlight it.
That road is now a constant target for Ukrainian ranged weapons (which is why they’ve been requesting them more and more). Artillery fire and UAVs can hit targets up and down them. Basically the Ukrainians have compressed the Russians into a pocket.
There is no way that a large force of BTGs can get everything it needs down one crappy road system that will be under constant fire. It needs fuel, ammunition, food, spare parts, replacement soldiers, etc. in an offensive you gobble up supplies.
Long story short. Unless the Russians expend real force to retake what they’ve lost, their army is more likely to be ‘fixed’ in and Izyum pocket than to ‘fix’ the Ukrainians in the Donbas. Moreover the Russians will have to move fast. Once supplies run low their options dwindle.
The next few days could determine the outcome of the war.
Btw, good luck driving from Belgorod to Izyum in 5 hours and 34 minutes as google maps suggests. Might take 5 days, if you got through alive.
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Discolouration on the hull at the waterline may be; side shell blown out by internal explosion; the hole where the missile went in; paint peeling due to the heat of the fire. I don't know what delay Neptune's fuze has, so it could have exploded deep in the ship. 2/n
Life rafts and ships' boats seem to have been launched - note the rather distinctive boat crane is deployed. So a large proportion of the crew may have gotten off. However it is clear smoke has spread throughout the after 1/2 of the ship. And that stuff is nasty. 3/n
As a minor aside, note the very low freeboard in way of the SA-N-4 launcher. Soviet-era ships have this very long quarterdeck and it's not a great idea as you have a lot less reserve of buoyancy. 3/n
The engagement radars for SA-N-4 and SA-N-6 both appear to be stowed. Given that the fire monitors seem to have been abandoned running I think it unlikely the radar were carefully stowed after the hit: This would lend credence to the story the crew were distracted by a UAV 4/n
The UAV would be an easy target so they may have been watching to see what it did. The distraction here is conceptual - it's not that they are looking the wrong way, it's that they are focussed on the wrong *type* of threat. This has happened to others before. 5/n
Labelled cutaway of Project 1164 here. Suspect point of impact was in way of the forward gas turbine room. Either in the hull or perhaps the superstructure, straight into the CIWS. AK-630 FCR Bass Tilt has a reversionary surveillance mode IIRC but I doubt it was in use. 10(?)/n
I mean 6/n, derp.
Another image here. Note the "knuckle" running the length of the hull. It looks to be still nearly horizontal, so if there is a trim angle, it is small. Flooding (at the point of this photo) may have been confined to amidships, but submergence of the deck aft is imminent 7/n
What's surprising is how far the smoke has spread. Whilst he seems to have been largely abandoned at this point, the bulk of the smoke is coming from amidships but again we see soot on the hull. This implies a rapid spread of smoke from fires subsequently extinguished 8/n
This raises questions about what damage control state the ship was in - I suspect low, as others have pointed out there was not much expectation of attack and WTDs are a pain to constantly operate. Smoke boundaries do not appear to have worked. 9/n
Of course we have to remember that a hit in the forward GT room is also close to some of the main command spaces, so coordinating the "internal battle" would have been very difficult 10/10 (for now)
"The Photo", for reference:
"1" marks lower hull damage that may be the result of a strike or the subsequent internal fire. "2" marks what appears to be a destroyed deckhouse (IIRC these ships have some aluminum in the deckhouses). However 2 could be due to cook-off of the AK-630 mag. Or a missile hit.
A point on hull shape. I don't see any evidence of hull overall hull sagging at this point. Straight lines added in MS Paint. The visible smoke fits with an internal fire involving a substantial amount of non-fire retardant, smoke generating materials, and 1/2
...and the presence of paint over most of the hull (on the side we can see, anyway) makes a widespread high-temperature fire unlikely. *Based on this one photograph only*. I would be *very* surprised if internal furnishings met modern fire resistance standards. 2/2
Note that we now know the fire monitors are on a tug on the far side of Moskva - not much change to the analysis, but added for completeness.
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