"All of Vlad's forces and all of Vlad's men, are out to put Humpty together again." (7 Viewers)

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I do hope that Oksana Markarova, Ukraine's ambassador to the USA is conveying to Zelenskyy the nuances of the US governmental system and the risks to Ukraine support presented by the separation of powers between Congress and POTUS and the consequences of the Dems losing the House majority last Nov. I expect in Ukraine the President's powers are near absolute, as we never hear about Zelenskyy having to wait for some representative consensus in the Verkhovna Rada (Ukraine's parliament) before acting on something.

In this light, delaying the launch of the big counteroffensive needs to be weighed against the risk that the US Congress might block further aid. If the counteroffensive is looking like a success, the US Congress might be inclined to back a winner. If not, trouble awaits.
 
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Ukrainian forces continuing to make progress north and south of Bakhmut, with advances of more than 3km in some places. They've recaptured as much ground in the last 2-3 days as Russia did in the last month. Some pro-Ukranian social media accounts report a number of instances of Russian conscripts surrendering in squad and platoon sized chunks during the 14th and 15th (likely troops from the 4th Motor Rifle brigade, which lost a bunch of officers thanks to a Ukrainian artillery strike on the brigade HQ).

Reports are that Russia is pushing in naval infantry and VDV paratroopers (both considered higher quality troops) to stabilize the situation.

Wagner Group pushing forward block by block into the western fringes of Bakhmut. Russian sources report that they've also gained ground following an attack north of Kupyansk and launched an attack near Adviivka. Not much news on the second from Russian sources, so likely it's been unsuccessful.


On the wider strategic level, there are reports that Russia is putting more effort into hardening the defenses of a number of airbases and key infrastructure (Crimea bridge maybe), following the introduction of Storm Shadow/SCALP into operation with Ukraine. Rumour is that Ukraine will receive 150+ of these. There's a LOT of targets within 200km of the forward edge of the battlefield that these will be able to be used on.

I had been anticipating a wider offensive from mid May onwards, but recent videos show territory is still unsuitable in large parts of Ukraine. Lots of mud about and poor weather.
 
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