Russia may launch new offensive on Kyiv in winter 2023, but is unlikely to succeed

This is reported by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW).

After two successful counter-offensives of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Kharkiv and Kherson regions, the situation does not force Ukraine to negotiate or offer concessions. Therefore, Putin may resume the offensive against our country in the winter of 2023.

“Russia may be setting conditions to conduct a new offensive against Ukraine— possibly against Kyiv—in winter 2023. Such an attack is extraordinarily unlikely to succeed.  A Russian attack from Belarus is not imminent at this time…Russian forces are extremely unlikely to be more successful at attacking northern Ukraine in the winter of 2023 than they were in February 2022,” ISW writes.

ISW experts believe that Russian forces are severely degraded and lack the combat power they have had in February 2022. Enemy troops failed to hold more than 70,000 km2 of occupied territory after they left Kyiv.

“Russian forces in Bakhmut currently advance no more than 100-200 meters a day after concentrating their main efforts there. Russia has not established air superiority let alone air supremacy in Ukraine and has largely exhausted its precision-guided munitions arsenal,” experts stress.

Meanwhile, Ukraine has prepared significant defensive fortifications in the North and is ready for the possible retention of the enemy.

“The terrain near the Belarusian-Ukrainian border is not conducive to maneuver warfare and possible invasion routes from Belarus to Kyiv run through defensible chokepoints in the Chernobyl exclusion zone that Ukrainian forces now have experience defending,” ISW adds.

• On December 6, Belarus announced the beginning of "planned combat training.”
• The very next day, the Ukrainian General Staff reported that the Border Guard Service and the Belarusian Armed Forces are increasingly dissatisfied with the military-political leadership’s actions. 
• On December 12, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that the Kremlin was pushing Lukashenko's regime to war in Ukraine in order to strengthen its control over Belarus.