ISW Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, November 8, 2023

Key Takeaways from the ISW:

• Ukrainian forces continued counteroffensive operations near Bakhmut and in western Zaporizhia Oblast on November 8.
• Select Russian milbloggers claimed that Russian commanders may be making operational and tactical decisions using maps of the battlefield in Ukraine that differ from tactical reality.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin promoted 44 Russian military and internal affairs officers, including Eastern Grouping of Forces Commander Andrei Kuzmenko, to general officer rank on November 8.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin will reportedly avoid centering his 2024 presidential campaign on the war in Ukraine and will rather focus on Russia’s alleged stability and criticisms of the West.
• Ukrainian partisans and military intelligence assassinated a prominent Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) official accused of conducting war crimes in occupied Ukraine.
• Russian forces conducted offensive operations along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line, near Bakhmut, near Avdiivka, west and southwest of Donetsk City, in western Donetsk Oblast, in the Donetsk-Zaporizhia Oblast border area, and in western Zaporizhia Oblast on November 8 and advanced in some areas.
• Russia is reportedly attempting to reacquire components for military equipment from states to which it previously sold the equipment, including Egypt, Pakistan, Brazil, and Belarus.
• Russian occupation administrations continue to create new administrative bodies meant to further integrate occupied territories into Russian governance systems.

Authors: Kateryna Stepanenko, Grace Mappes, Angelica Evans, Christina Harward, and Frederick W. Kagan.

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