Vladimir Putin’s spring offensive appears to have started but is “more of a whimper” than a decisive large-scale attack, western officials said on Wednesday.
Russian forces have sought to advance at multiple locations on the frontline in eastern Ukraine, particularly around the town of Bakhmut in the Donetsk province.
“Indications are that an offensive has started but has been more of a whimper than maybe what we would have expected,” said one western official.
Putin’s generals were said to be struggling to “mass” troops and lacked the necessary operational reserve to “generate any kind of momentum or punch to launch their offensive”.
The western official added: “It just isn’t there for them to conduct a large-scale attack which we might have expected previously over a year ago.
“The operational reserve, our assessment is that it does not exist at the moment.
“If it does exist in any terms of numbers, then it’s those mobilised troops which have yet to be trained which effectively is not a mobilised reserve.”
Putin’s private army, the Wagner Group, and regular Russian forces were said to be making “incremental” progress in seizing territory at Bakhmut, according to military analysts.
But they have reportedly suffered very large losses, particularly the Wagner troops some of which are recruited from Russian jails and have been thrown at Ukrainian defences in “human waves”.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky recently said that his forces would continue defending Bakhmut but not “at any price”.
“Bakhmut will become increasingly untenable for them (Ukraine) to defend so at some point they will have to make the decision to withdraw rather than being forced out,” said a western official.
But pulling out of Bakhmut would not be an “operational, strategtic loss” for Kyiv, he added.
Up to 300,000 Russian troops are believed to be in Ukraine at the moment, with tens of thouands of them with little training having been deployed shortly after Putin’s part-mobilisation announced in the autumn.
For months now, the conflict has been two forces engaged largely in trench warfare.
The West hopes that the supply of scores of Leopard tanks, as well as 14 Challenger II models from Britain, and other heavy weaponry will play a key role in allowing “momentum to build in favour of the Ukrainians through spring and summer”.
The western official said: “The Ukrainians need to go on the offensive if they are going to take back territory and the way that they can do that is by using manoeuvre rather than being stuck in a trench line which they are predominantly at the moment.”
Leopard tanks will give Ukrainians “some punch” once their troops are trained in using them, he added.
Britain estimates that Russia, including the Wagner Group, has suffered up to 200,000 military casualties, with as many as 60,000 killed, in Putin’s war launched on February 24 last year.
Ukrainian forces are also believed to have been hit by high casualties, of at least 100,000.
The US, UK, Ukraine and its allies are fighting an information war against Moscow so briefings from the West need to be treated with caution but are far more believable than the propaganda issued by the Kremlin.
More than 40,000 civilians are also reported to have been killed, often by indiscriminate Russian shelling and air strikes.
In the past 24 hours, Russia launched 59 attacks from heavy rocket systems, Ukraine’s military said in an early Wednesday report.
Bakhmut came under shelling, along with 20 other settlements in the area, it said.
Outspoken Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin chastised Russian military leaders, accusing them of depriving his Wagner fighters of munitions in what he called a treasonous attempt to destroy his military company.
The Russian defence ministry rejected his accusation about blocking ammunition as “absolutely untrue”.
