1 Institute for the Study of War & The Critical Threats Project 2023
Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, February 14, 2023
George Barros, Kateryna Stepanenko, Karolina Hird, Angela
Howard, Nicole Wolkov, and Frederick Kagan
February 14, 8:15 pm ET
Click here to see ISW’s interactive map of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This map is
updated daily alongside the static maps present in this report.
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin signaled on February 14 that the Ukraine Defense
Contact Group’s 54 member states will continue to support Ukraine in the long run.
Austin stated that the Ukraine Defense Contact Group (a coalition of 54 states supporting Ukraine’s
defense) will “support Ukraine's fight for freedom over the long haul” and will support Ukraine during
a spring counteroffensive.
1
The Washington Post reported on February 13 that the Biden
administration will announce a new aid package for Ukraine “in the next week.”
2
The Washington Post reported that US officials have privately signaled to Ukraine that
Western security aid to Ukraine is finite, however. The Washington Post reported on February
13 that an anonymous US government official stated that US government officials are trying to “impress
upon [Ukrainian officials] that [the US Government] can’t do anything and everything forever.”
3
The
Washington Post also reported that US officials stated that recent Western aid packages for Ukraine
“represent Kyiv’s best chance to decisively change the course of the war.“
4
Western reporting indicates that there continue to be Western concerns about Ukraine’s
determination to hold Bakhmut. The Washington Post also reported that US defense planners
assess that Ukrainian forces are unable to simultaneously defend Bakhmut and launch a spring
counteroffensive and have urged Ukraine to prioritize the spring counteroffensive over defending
Bakhmut.
5
ISW continues to assess that Ukraine’s decision to defend Bakhmut is likely a strategically
sound effort despite its costs for Ukraine.
6
Ukraine’s defense of Bakhmut has forced the Kremlin to
expend much of the Wagner Group as a force and commit high-value Russian airborne forces to sustain
attritional advances.
7
Ukrainian defense of Bakhmut has degraded significant Russian forces and will
likely set favorable conditions for a future Ukrainian counteroffensive. Had Russian troops taken
Bakhmut without significant Ukrainian resistance they could have hoped to expand operations in ways
that could have forced Ukraine to construct hasty defensive positions in less favorable terrain.
Therefore, Ukraine’s defense of Bakhmut and undertaking an effort to set conditions for a
counteroffensive are likely complementary, not mutually exclusive, activities considering that Russian
forces would have continued their offensive beyond Bakhmut had Ukraine yielded the city earlier.
The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) is reportedly recruiting convicts and mimicking
the Wagner Group’s treatment of convicts as cannon fodder. CNN reported that the Russian
MoD had been directly recruiting prisoners who deployed to Soledar, Donetsk Oblast, into formations
of the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) 2nd Army Corps in October 2022.
8
Convicts complained to
CNN about gruesome abuses and noted that they suffered heavy casualties after they were ordered to
storm Ukrainian defensive positions. CNN also obtained a recording from a deceased convict who
feared that the Russian MoD would execute him after he survived an assault on Soledar, though this
soldier was killed in action days later anyway. These convicts specified that the Russian MoD recruited
