Exclusive Interview: Ukraine and Beyond Through the Lens of U.S. Military Intelligence

BAKHMUT, UKRAINE – APRIL 17: Ukrainian military members go on the combat mission on April 17, 2023 in Bakhmut, Ukraine. In Bakhmut, both warring parties do not engage in shooting battles with each other, in close contact. Aerial reconnaissance of both sides sees the enemy with the help of drones and directs artillery. The housing stock of the city is destroyed. About 95% of the people in Bakhmut are now military. The military and civilians who remained in the city are mostly in basements, hiding from shelling. It is possible to move around Bakhmut only from shelter to shelter, hiding from surveillance drones that direct fire at places of gathering of people. Russian forces do not fire at clearly defined targets but divides the city into squares and destroys everything inside the square with shelling, thus systematically destroying Bakhmut, moving from one square to another. (Photo by Viktor Fridshon/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images)

Posted: May 16th, 2023

SUBSCRIBER+EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW — The battle for Bakhmut, where Russian paramilitaries have been leading an eight-month effort to take the symbolically significant Ukrainian city, was widely expected to be at least a boost for beleaguered Russian morale, if not a stepping-stone for eastern Ukraine. But this week, it was Ukrainian forces who were reportedly advancing with their first major battlefield gains in the struggle to capture what was once a 17th century fort town.

“The advance of our troops along the Bakhmut direction is the first success of offensive actions in the defense of Bakhmut,” Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, Ukrainian Commander of Ground Forces, said Monday, in his country’s first major operation since November.

Access all of The Cipher Brief’s national security-focused expert insight by becoming a Cipher Brief Subscriber+ Member.