Thread by @PhillipsPOBrien

A thread on what intelligence is saying about the situation for any battle in the Donbas, by referring to the US Department of Defense unnamed briefing yesterday by a 'senior' official. defense.gov/News/Transcrip…

Starting with the air war--and it remains vital that Ukraine continue contesting Russian airpower as they have done. Little surprise here, Russian sortie rate is remaining constant, concentrating on Mariupol and the Donbas. Key help for Ukraine is to get them more Anti-air.

State of the Russian buildup in Donbas. Russia has sent some more BTGs into the region, somewhat fewer than 10. The estimate is that there are approx 40 Russian BTGs in the area. No est given on size of BTGs.

Not stated where the new forces come from, but seems decidedly unlikely considering the forces withdrawn from Kyiv seem in pretty rough shape. Many BTGs from that area seem to have been wiped out, others are so small they need to be combined with other groups.

Putting together these units, and others is being complicated by the fact that Russian logistics both in Ukraine and Russia itself are still experiencing problems.

There is also the report that Russia is trying to mobilize 60,000 more reservists. Though the official seems non-committal on how this is going and whether indeed these troops can be combined in combat worthy formations.

Russian military plans for their troops is to 'fix' Ukrainian forces in the Donbas first and foremost. If they can do that, maybe they will want to head west again, but there seems to be little if any concrete planning for that.

Quick summation. Russia might have somewhere between 30k -35k soldiers in Donbas. They can attack from the air, but dont have air control. Not clear what the logistics situation is in the region, but there are issues and its likely these units are below strength.

Sounds like significant reinforcement from the Russian troops withdrawn from Kyiv is still a ways off (weeks?) and for those reserves being mobilized perhaps longer.

So Russia can attack with upwards of 40 BTGs, imho, not enough to take and hold the whole Donbas. They still need significant reinforcement. Of course they are also stuck in a bit of a dilemma.

The 30 Russians BTGs that have been in the Donbas since the start cant stay forever and will suffer increasing attrition if they wait longer for more reinforcement. Bit of a damned if they do, damned if they dont.

Putting this here. Wrote an article for the @spectator about the numbers dilemma that could be facing the Russian Army. Seems a good place for it.

https://twitter.com/spectator/status/1512739598497103879?s=20&t=UQXW_rW4gz2EMhWGXDc0cw

Another piece of evidence that there won’t be huge reinforcements rushed from the Russian forces pushed back from Kyiv to Russian forces in Donbas.

https://twitter.com/kyivindependent/status/1512820761031065608

Adding this thread from the always interesting @TrentTelenko here, as it adds more evidence to the idea of a real personnel shortage which is looming (and in some ways has already happened) for the Russians.

https://twitter.com/trenttelenko/status/1512976260665909260