⚡️Key Takeaways from the Institute for the Study of War as of December 23:
🔻ISW assesses that the Kremlin has been setting conditions for a new, most dangerous course of action (MDCOA)—a renewed offensive from Belarus possibly aimed at Kyiv—since at least October 2022.
🔻The Kremlin may be conducting an information operation or may actually be preparing for this MDCOA, which ISW continues to assess to be unlikely but possible.
🔻Prominent Russian pro-war military bloggers are amplifying the possibility of the MDCOA over the winter-spring period.
🔻The Russian military continues to trip indicators for the MCDOA, reinforcing an information operation designed to establish the plausibility of the MDCOA or preparations to execute it.
🔻The Russian military has more clearly been setting conditions for an offensive in northwestern Luhansk Oblast.
🔻Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is reportedly preparing to present a peace plan in February 2023, which could be timed to exploit a failed Russian winter offensive.
🔻Russian President Vladimir Putin’s renewed public appearances likely indicate that he has become more concerned about his popularity and image in Russia.
🔻Russian forces conducted at least two reconnaissance-in-force operations in northern and northeastern Ukraine on December 22-23.
🔻Ukrainian forces likely made tactical gains east and south of Bakhmut City over the past 72 hours.
🔻Russian forces are continuing to establish defensive positions in the left bank of Kherson and Zaporizhia Oblasts and are conducting defensive operations in southern Ukraine.
🔻The Kremlin is intensifying its censorship efforts to silence concerns over an expansion of the Russian Armed Forces and a second mobilization wave.
🔻Ukrainian partisans continued to target Russian officials in occupied territories.
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