ISW Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, June 17, 2023

Key Takeaways

• Ukrainian forces continued counteroffensive actions on at least four sectors of the front.
• A delegation representing seven African states met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg following a meeting with Ukrainian President Zelensky on June 16 to propose a generalized peace plan focused on resuming international trade.
• The Kremlin will likely exploit this proposal to promote Russian information operations aiming to slow Western security assistance to Ukraine and has not demonstrated any intent to meaningfully engage with any peace process.
• Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin continued to signal his disinterest in formally subordinating the Wagner private military company (PMC) to the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD).
• The New York Times (NYT) released a report supporting ISW’s prior assessment that Russian forces most likely destroyed the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (KHPP) dam.
• Russian forces conducted limited ground attacks on the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line, and Ukrainian forces reportedly conducted localized ground attacks west and south of Kreminna.
• Russian forces and Ukrainian forces continued limited attacks in the Bakhmut area and on the Avdiivka-Donetsk City line.
• Russian forces continued offensive operations near Vuhledar likely in response to Ukrainian territorial gains in the area on June 16.
• Ukrainian forces continued counteroffensive operations near the administrative border between western Donetsk and eastern Zaporizhia oblasts.
• Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces intensified attacks in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• The Kremlin continues efforts to gradually mobilize Russia’s defense industrial base (DIB).
• Russian officials are planning several infrastructure projects connecting occupied Zaporizhia Oblast to occupied Crimea, likely to secure new ground lines of communication (GLOCs) for the Russian grouping in southern Ukraine.

Authors: Riley Bailey, Grace Mappes, Kateryna Stepanenko, and Mason Clark.

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