Explainer
Ukraine war: Why is Bakhmut so important to Russia and a ‘thorn in the side of Putin’?
After nine months of ferocious battle and huge numbers of casualties, Russia claims it has now captured the city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine. But does the fight say more about Vladimir Putin’s political position than his country’s success on the battlefield?
Michael Drummond
Foreign news reporter @MikeRDrummond
Monday 22 May 2023 14:28, UK
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Yevgeny Prigozhin's Wagner Group military company members wave a Russian national and Wagner flag atop a damaged building in Bakhmut, Ukraine
Pic:Prigozhin Press Service /AP
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Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group military company members wave a Russian national and Wagner flag atop a damaged building in Bakhmut, Ukraine. Pic: AP Pic:Prigozhin Press Service /AP
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The landscape around the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut has come to resemble a First World War battlefield, the ground carved up by artillery and cut with networks of trenches.
For nine months, Russian forces including Wagner Group mercenaries have relentlessly attacked the city as they pursue full control of the Donbas region.
Now Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin is claiming that his forces have finally captured the city and Vladimir Putin has congratulated those who fought there.
But Ukraine has refused to concede, with Volodymyr Zelenskyy saying that the defence of the city still stands.
So why is Bakhmut so important to Russia?
Strategically it isn’t, retired air vice-marshal Sean Bell tells Sky News.
“Bakhmut is not a significant military target”, he says.
But set in the context of the wider Russian effort to capture all of the Donbas, Bakhmut has been part of a pocket of territory still controlled by Ukrainian forces that has been a “thorn in the side of Putin”, Mr Bell added.
The UK’s Ministry of Defence previously said that capturing the city would have “limited operational value” to Moscow, though it added it would “potentially allow Russia to threaten the larger urban areas of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk”.
Wagner group in Bakhmut1:09
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Is Russia claiming Bakhmut significant?
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What have Yevgeny Prigozhin and Wagner been doing at Bakhmut?
Much of Moscow’s offensives around the city have been manned by Wagner Group mercenaries, including huge numbers of convicts who have been taken from Russian prisons and sent to the frontline.
After effectively telling Vladimir Putin that Wagner could prevail at Bakhmut where the Russian army could not – and then failing to take the city for so long – Prigozhin began blaming Russia for the lack of progress, Mr Bell said.
“He’s not a military expert. So Bakhmut suddenly becomes not about the military significance, it’s all about the political significance and Putin telling him and the battle between them about power and legacy.
“So I suspect that’s why Bakhmut has become this sort of iconic moment in the war when from a military perspective it’s very hard to understand how it how it got there.”
Now after nine months of gruelling, costly battle for the city, Wagner forces have been filmed raising Russian flags in the ruins of Bakhmut.
Smoke billows after Russian attacks in the outskirts of Bakhmut, Ukraine
PIC:AP
Image:
Much of the city has been levelled to the ground by Russian artillery. Pic: AP
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Another feature of the battle for Bakhmut, Mr Bell says, is the difference in styles of warfare between the Ukrainians and the Russians.
“Russia has simply got untrained conscripts, ‘here’s a gun, fire it’.
“And what we’re seeing on the battlefield – and Bakhmut’s a really good example – is Russia have levelled it by doing loads and loads of carpet bombing.
“What the Ukrainians have been doing is surgically striking their resupply, surgically striking where their leadership is, surgically striking their bomb dumps.”
He likened Russia’s strategy to a war of attrition like those seen in the two world wars, whereas Ukraine has been using modern joined-up military thinking.
“It feels like a clash of cultures where the Russians’ only experience is fighting 20th century warfare, whereas the Ukrainians are fighting using Western technology in 21st century warfare,” he added.
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