WASHINGTON – Russian forces are closing in on a critical logistical hub in eastern Ukraine that is key to sustaining Kyiv’s troops in their fight against the invaders, experts have warned — describing the city as the “last well-defended Ukrainian strong point” in its battle against Moscow’s brutal eastern offensive.
Russia is pouring its resources into advancing on Pokrovsk, a town of 60,000 that’s home to a logistics hub vital to Ukraine’s front lines – even if it means leaving their own territory largely open to Kyiv’s forces, who are fighting in Russia’s Kursk region.
Kyiv has already begun evacuating the sizeable town in southeastern Ukraine, which sits at the convergence of multiple highways and logistical lines that experts tell The Post are critical to keeping Ukrainian forces throughout the Donbas supplied with what they need.
“It sits at the juncture of a couple of key highways which serve as arterial lines, supply lines to ensure that ammunition, food, medicine and other key supplies actually make it to frontline forces,” Institute for the Study of War analyst George Barros told The Post on Thursday.
“Without good logistics, it’s incredibly difficult to have an effective fighting force and have combat power. Your soldiers are only so good insofar as they are properly equipped, they’re properly supplied, that they actually have the material that they need to be able to fight,” he added.
‘Flooring it’
Should Russia break through, crushing that strongpoint would represent one of their biggest wins in months as the typically standstill war crawls past its 2.5-year mark, said John Hardie, deputy director of the Russia program at the non-partisan Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington.
“If [Pokrovsk] falls, I think it’ll really complicate Ukraine’s defense in that part of Donetsk oblast,” Hardie told The Post on Thursday, referencing the town’s logistical importance. “I think you could enable the Russians to kind of push southward, trying to basically push Ukraine out of the area.”
Still, Barros said he predicts Russia will exert so many resources going after Pokrovsk that they won’t be capable of pushing much further.
“I’m not forecasting that Pokrovsk will necessarily fail, but what we’re seeing with the Russians is that [it would come] at tremendous cost. They’re really flooring it on their accelerator, and they’re hellbound on seizing Pokrovsk.”
“They might tire out and peter out either right before they hit Pokrovsk, they could tire out in the middle of the Battle of Pokrovsk and not seize the city, or will be a long, protracted, multi-month battle, like how we saw with Bakhmut,” he continued.
“And then even if the Russians seize Pokrovsk, I’m fairly confident that they’re going to be exhausted and peter out at that point, and we’re likely not going to see sort of a second wind or a follow-up operation for a long time.”
Though the fight has not yet reached Pokrovsk’s city limits, fighting rages on in its surrounding small towns and villages – areas where Barros said Russians do better.
“The situation is extremely difficult, the key Russian efforts and their largest forces are concentrated there, and the resilience of each of our units, our ability to destroy the occupier, are now very important,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an address Wednesday night.
As of Thursday, Moscow’s military had gotten within roughly six miles of Pokrovsk – the closest they have gotten to taking a more-densely populated town since the battles over Avdiivka in February and Bakmut in May of 2023, whose losses had a devastating effect on Ukrainian morale.
“Pokrovsk is sort of like the last large linchpin of a city in western and southern Donetsk. There’s no other town that approximates its size of the vicinity, so it is sort of the last well-defended Ukrainian strong point for defending this part of the front,” Barros said.
‘Exchange fund‘
Ukraine’s General Staff said in an update Thursday that the war’s current “hottest” fighting is in the Pokrovsk sector, making more than 23 separate attempts to attack Ukrainian positions in the area on Thursday alone.
“Fights are exceptionally tough. The enemy throws everything that can move and come into battle, trying to disrupt the defenses of our troops,” Ukrainian Armed Forces commander-in-chief Gen. Alexander Sirsky said in a statement.
“In such conditions, our main task is to strengthen the defense of our troops in the most difficult areas of the frontline, to provide the brigades with sufficient ammunition and other material equipment.”
It comes as Ukrainian forces venture further into Russia’s Kursk region, taking dozens of Russian troops as prisoners of war in the area each day. Zelensky calls it his country’s “exchange fund” – with each new capture, Ukrainians hope to be able to trade the Russian prisoners for their own held in Moscow’s grip.
“We continue to expand the territory under our control in the designated areas near the border of Ukraine,” Zelensky said. “Today, as every day, our exchange fund has also been replenished. Thank you, warriors!”
“This is something that will help bring home many of our people from Russian captivity. We must also understand now that all the pressure we have transferred to Russia means that they cannot put any more pressure on our Donetsk region,” he added.
The move, which was at least partially intended to drive Russian troops out of Ukraine to protect their own land, has been met with skepticism. Its utility has proven more effective in messaging than it has in actual strategic benefit, as Russian President Vladimir Putin has instead kept his troops focused on Pokrovsk.
“Evidence suggests that [Russia is] not so worried about [Kursk] they want to, you know, kind of drop what they’re doing in Pokrovsk to deal with Kursk,” Hardie said. “It seems like they’re willing and able to do both at the same time.”
“This incursion to Kursk was embarrassing, and [they] don’t want it to stay forever. But, you know, leaving it be for now isn’t the worst thing in the world if it gives [them] this opportunity to advance in the Donbas,” he added.
