Essential Takeaways

• Russian forces done yet another massive wave of missile strikes throughout Ukraine on November 17
• Russian forces in jap Kherson Oblast are likely partially vulnerable to a Ukrainian interdiction campaign these kinds of as the one Ukrainian forces efficiently exploited to retake western Kherson Oblast.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree changing the composition of the Russian Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Legal rights (HRC) on November 17.
• Russian sources continued to assert that Ukrainian troops are conducting counteroffensive operations along the Svatove-Kreminna line.
• Russian forces ongoing ground assaults about Bakhmut, Avdiivka, and southwest of Donetsk Metropolis.
• Ukrainian troops continued targeting Russian armed service belongings and focus locations on the east lender of Kherson Oblast and in the rear areas of Zaporizhia Oblast on November 17.
• Russian authorities continue on to deal with discontented mobilized staff and small morale on the entrance strains.
• Russian profession officials ongoing to wipe out Ukrainian lifestyle in Russian-occupied territories.

Russian forces conducted a different massive wave of missile strikes across Ukraine on November 17. The Ukrainian Basic Staff members noted that Russian troops launched five airstrikes and 25 cruise missile strikes at civilian infrastructure objects in Dnipropetrovsk, Odesa, Kharkiv, Zaporizhia, Dnipropetrovsk, and Mykolaiv oblasts all over the day.[1] Ukrainian Air Force Command famous that Ukrainian air defense forces destroyed 4 cruise missiles, five Shahed-136 drones, and two Kh-59 guided missiles.[2] Russian forces carried out the premier missile attack due to the fact the start off of the war on November 15, and as ISW has previously assessed, this sort of missile strategies are consuming Russia’s by now depleted shop of precision munitions.[3]

Russian forces in jap Kherson Oblast are probably partly susceptible to a Ukrainian interdiction campaign these types of as the just one Ukrainian forces correctly exploited to retake western Kherson Oblast. Many important floor lines of conversation (GLOCs) operate by way of japanese Kherson Oblast into other Russian-controlled locations in southern Ukraine: the southern T2202 Nova Kahkovka-Armiansk route, the southeastern P47 Kakovkha-Henichesk route, and the M14 freeway that runs eastward into Melitopol, Berdyansk, and Mariupol. Geolocated satellite imagery suggests that Russian troops are establishing defensive positions together some of these vital GLOCs, and social media reporting implies that Ukrainian strikes have already started concentrating on Russian focus regions and armed service belongings on these routes.[4] The minimal range of significant-high-quality roadways and railways in this spot, specifically connecting Crimea to the mainland, produces prospective bottlenecks that could be susceptible to Ukrainian interdiction attempts that would gradually degrade the Russian ability to carry on giving its grouping in jap Kherson Oblast and other areas of southern Ukraine. ISW beforehand described the targeting of identical bottlenecks together critical GLOCS–not just the bridges throughout the Dnipro River–during Ukraine’s Kherson counteroffensive in late August to mid-Oct culminated in the Russian withdrawal from the west lender of Kherson Oblast to positions even more south of the Dnipro River. Ukrainian forces will probable come across it more difficult to reach this sort of spectacular outcomes in eastern Kherson but may perhaps be in a position to disrupt Russian initiatives to solidify and hold their new defensive lines.

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree shifting the composition of the Russian Presidential Council for Civil Society and Human Rights (HRC) on November 17.[5] The decree notably expels four Russian human legal rights activists, which includes Ekaterina Vinokurova, who wrote a piece criticizing the increase of “patriotic” Telegram channels and nationalist milbloggers who have cornered the information and facts space towards opposition shops who deviate from the predominant Kremlin line of the war in Ukraine.[6] Russian media earlier described that Vinokurova and other members of the HRC appealed to the Russian Investigative Committee to search into the broadly circulated video clip of the execution of a previous Wagner Team fighter who reportedly defected to Ukraine.[7] Putin’s new appointees to the HRC contain a slate of Russian political and proxy associates and notably Sasha Kots, a outstanding milblogger and war correspondent who has been greatly involved in covering Russian operations in Ukraine.[8] Kots most a short while ago called for Russia to keep enormous missile strikes from essential Ukrainian infrastructure on November 17.[9] This decree very likely represents the Kremlin’s broader hard work to stifle domestic civil opposition by continuing to system prominent voices in the info room that propagate the Kremlin’s line on the war in Ukraine.

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