Ukraine Russia war: US warns Avdiivka could fall

World News@lemmy.world – 134 points – 9 months ago

Ukraine Russia war: US warns Avdiivka could fall

The US has warned that Russia could seize Ukraine's key eastern town of Avdiivka - the scene of some of the fiercest fighting in recent months.

"Avdiivka is at risk of falling into Russian control," National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said, citing Ukraine's ammunition shortages.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky vowed to do everything to "save as many Ukrainian lives as possible".

Russian troops have made gains in Avdiivka, threatening to encircle it.

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Annoying and sad if it happens, but it offers Russia little or no strategic value in the grand scheme of the war. It really only serves as a propaganda piece in an already rigged election. As long as the soldiers occupying the city are able to retreat before they're encircled and destroyed, things will be okay.

Avdiivka is actually fairly important, unlike Bakhmut. It was both a transportation hub and (one of) the most reinforced part of the frontline.

I appreciate your opinion on the matter, but I am still going to choose to trust the professional war analysts at ISW who have this to say about Avdiivka.

The potential Russian capture of Avdiivka would not be operationally significant and would likely only offer the Kremlin immediate informational and political victories. Russian forces have been conducting offensive operations to capture Avdiivka since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and Avdiivka has been a notable Ukrainian strongpoint defensive position since the Russian invasion in 2014.[11] Russian forces began a localized offensive operation to capture Avdiivka in October 2023 and only recently began to make tactical progress through the settlement after months of costly infantry assaults and waves of mass mechanized attacks.[12] Avdiivka is a small settlement with a pre-war population of roughly 31,000 people and offers Russian forces limited avenues for future advance.[13] (Bakhmut had a pre-invasion population of 70,000 people, in comparison.) Ukrainian forces have long fortified many of the surrounding settlements, which Russian forces are also struggling to capture, and subsequent Ukrainian positions west and north of Avdiivka are likely similarly fortified.[14] The nearest relatively large settlements in the area are at least 30 kilometers west of Avdiivka, and Russian forces have not shown that they can conduct the rapid mechanized forward movement that would be required to reach these settlements in the near or even medium-term.[15] Russian forces have expended a considerable amount of manpower and materiel on their effort to capture Avdiivka and will likely need to engage in a prolonged period of consolidation, reconstitution, and rest before attempting a further concerted offensive effort in the area.[16] Russian forces would be highly unlikely to make rapid operationally significant advances from Avdiivka if they captured the settlement, and the potential Russian capture of Avdiivka at most would set conditions for further limited tactical gains.

Eh, this is what Ukrainians say on this matter.

“Avdiivka is important for them to control the space around Donetsk, you have control of dominant heights there, and they can build logistics corridors to supply a large area of the front,” said Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in an interview in Kyiv earlier this month, explaining the importance of holding on to Avdiivka. “This is not about symbolism, this is about the operative importance of a particular territory,” he added.

From https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/16/ukrainian-forces-give-up-some-positions-in-avdiivka-as-russian-assault-continues