In its latest analysis of the war in Ukraine, published on Thursday night, the ISW wrote that Vladimir Putin’s “August 25 decree to increase the size of the Russian military starting in January 2023 is unlikely to generate significant combat power in the near future and indicates that Putin is unlikely to order a mass mobilisation soon.”
Putin ‘determined to avoid full mobilisation’
The US experts noted that Putin’s decree “increases the nominal end strength of the Russian Armed Forces by 137,000 military personnel, from 1,013,628 to 1,150,628, starting on January 1, 2023.”
According to the ISW, the Russian army “likely seeks to recover losses from its invasion of Ukraine and generate forces to sustain its operation in Ukraine.”
The think tank further pointed out that “The announcement of a relatively modest (yet likely still unattainable) increased end strength target strongly suggests that Putin remains determined to avoid full mobilisation.”
Russia ‘unlikely’ to meet end-strength target
In the US experts’ view, “the Kremlin is unlikely to generate sufficient forces to reach an end strength of over 1,150,000 soldiers as the decree stipulates.”
In this connection, the ISW noted that the Russian army “has not historically met its end-strength targets.”
For instance “It had only about 850,000 active-duty military personnel in 2022 before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine,” which was “well shy of its nominal end strength target of over one million,” the US analysts said.
Zaporizhzhia nuclear station disconnects from power grid due to shelling
Meanwhile, the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) disconnected from the power grid for the first time in its operational history on Thursday, news outlets reported.
Ukraine’s nuclear operating enterprise Energoatom “reported that Russian shelling caused the disconnection by starting fires at ash pits near the Zaporizhzhia Thermal Power Plant (ZTPP), approximately 5km from the ZNPP,” the ISW said in its analysis.
As the think tank noted, “Energoatom stated that the ZTPP is currently supplying the ZNPP with power and that work is ongoing to reconnect one of the ZNPP power units back to the Ukrainian power grid.”
The ISW pointed out that Russian sources “accused Ukrainian forces of firing at the ZNPP, but Russia has not provided clear evidence of Ukrainian troops striking the plant.”
The US experts added that according to Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR), “Russian troops deliberately conducted mortar strikes against the ash pits at the ZTPP.”
The ISW noted that the GUR “also has not provided clear evidence to support its claims,” adding: “The Russians’ failure to provide unequivocal evidence of the extensive shelling they accuse Ukraine of conducting is more noteworthy, however, because Russia controls the ground and could provide more conclusive evidence far more easily than Ukraine could.”
Meanwhile, during a phone call late on Thursday, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and US head of state Joe Biden "called for Russia to return full control of the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant to Ukraine and for International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to the plant," the White House said.
Developments on Ukraine’s frontlines
Assessing the latest developments on the frontlines of Ukraine’s war against Russian aggression, the ISW noted that Russian forces “conducted limited ground attacks northwest and northeast of Slovyansk, northeast and south of Bakhmut, and northwest of Donetsk City,” in Ukraine’s southeastern Donetsk region.
Russian troops also conducted “a limited ground attack in northwestern Kharkiv Oblast” in northeastern Ukraine and “limited ground attacks in northwestern Kherson Oblast,” in the south of the country, the US think tank reported.
It added that Ukrainian forces “continued to target Russian military assets and ground lines of communication (GLOCs) in Kherson Oblast.”
Meanwhile, “Russian federal subjects (regions) are continuing recruitment efforts for volunteer battalions, which are continuing to deploy to training grounds in Russia and to Ukraine,” the US experts noted.
The ISW added that “Russian occupation administrators are continuing to take measures to mitigate challenges to their authority and facilitate the economic and educational integration of occupied territories into the Russian system.”
Friday is day 184 of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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Source: understandingwar.org, PAP, Reuters