The Hoegh Esperanza LNG floating storage regasification unit (FSRU) docks at the Wilhelmshaven liquified natural gas terminal, Germany, December 17, 2022 (Liesa Johannssen/Bloomberg/Getty)


Friday’s Coverage: US Senate Approves $44.9 Billion in Aid for Kyiv


Source: Institute for the Study of War


UPDATE 1937 GMT:

The head of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, has explained why Russian forces have spent months trying to overrun the city of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine even though it has lost its strategic importance.

The Russians have tried to seize Bakhmut, in the Donetsk region, since May. But in September, the Ukrainian counter-offensive liberating the neighboring Kharkiv region overtook Bakhmut’s position at the southern end of a Russian defensive line.

But Russian forces, led by the mercenary Wagner Group, have continued to throw wave after wave of troops at Bakhmut. Amid heavy casualties on both sides, Ukraine’s military has held out but much of the city — with about 12,000 of the pre-invasion population of 70,000 — has been levelled.

Budanov says Wagner Group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin, an ally of Vladimir Putin, is on a crusade to upstage rival commanders in Russia’s regular army. He has aligned with Gen. Sergei Surovikin, appointed in September as commander of Russian forces in Ukraine, against Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu.

“There is only an ideological and media question here,” Budanov says. “That is a reason Wagner units are trying so fanatically to capture this town. They need to show they are a force, and they can do what the Russian army could not. We see that clearly and understand.”


UPDATE 1930 GMT:

The death toll from today’s Russian shelling of Kherson city in southern Ukraine has risen to 10.

Another 55 people are wounded. Eighteen, including a 6-year-old child, are in “grave condition”, said Governor Yaroslav Yanushevych.


UPDATE 1552 GMT:

The head of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, says that an invasion of northern Ukraine from neighboring Belarus is unlikely.

Moscow has amplified signals of mobilization in Belarus. The campaign culminated earlier this week with Vladimir Putin’s trip to Minsk to see Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko.

However, Lukashenko appears to be holding out against any direct Belarusian ground or air involvement in Putin’s invasion, emphasizing Minsk’s “sovereignty”.

Speaking to the New York Times, Budanov said Moscow may be trying to divert Ukrainian troops from eastern frontlines by holding up the prospect of operations in the north.

“These are all elements of disinformation campaigns,” he summarizes.

Budanov said none of the newly-arrived Russian troops in Belarus are arrayed in assault formations. Training camps for Russian soldiers are filled with newly-mobilized civilians who, after basic training, are sent to fight in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine. Russia’s training sites lack sufficient armored vehicles in working order to attack the north.

Still, the intelligence head says, “It would be wrong to discount this possibility — but also wrong to say we have any data confirming it exists.”


UPDATE 1414 GMT:

A Ukrainian court in Poltava has convicted two Russian mercenaries and two soldiers of violating the laws and customs of war, sentencing each to 11 years in prison.

The men were found to have tortured three war veterans, denying them food and water, in the village of Borova in the Kharkiv region in northeast Ukraine. All four pleaded guilty.

Borova, a town near the strategic city of Izuim, was occupied through the spring and summer. It was liberated on October 3.

Investigators have discovered more than 50 torture chambers in areas liberated from the Russians across Ukarine.


UPDATE 1126 GMT:

The latest Russian attacks on Kherson city in southern Ukraine have killed eight civilians and wounded 58. Eighteen of the injured are in serious condition, including a 6-year-old girl.

Russia shelled 74 times with artillery. Governor Yaroslav Yanushevich said:

On a weekend, on the eve of Christmas, the Russians attacked the city center. They attacked the market, shopping center, residential buildings, administrative buildings – the places where the most people are.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy denounced the attacks as terrorism, posting photographs of the aftermath with casualties lying on the street.

These are not military facilities. This is not a war according to the rules defined. It is terror, it is killing for the sake of intimidation and pleasure.

The world must see and understand what absolute evil we are fighting against.

Two civilians were killed and five wounded in the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine. One person was killed in the Kharkiv region in the northeast by Russian mortar fire.


UPDATE 1106 GMT:

UK military intelligence assesses that Russia has been forced to limit its missile strikes across Ukraine because of diminishing stocks.

From October 10, Russia has carried out waves of missile and drone assaults against energy infrastructure and other civilian sites. The largest attack was with more than 100 missiles as well as Iran-supplied “kamikaze” drones. The most recent waves have been of more than 70 missiles and 35 drones — 85% of the missiles and 30 of the drones were downed by Ukrainian air defenses.

The British analysts says the missile strikes have dropped to about once a week. They also assess Russia can no longer make enough artillery munitions to enable large-scale offensive operations.

But in his nightly address to the nation, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned that Russia could launch more strikes over Christmas: “With the holiday season fast approaching, the Russian terrorists could again step up their activities. They have no regard for Christian values or any values for that matter.”

He urged, “Pay attention to air raid alarms, help one another, and look out for one another”.


UPDATE 1058 GMT:

The US Congress has completed passage of a $1.7 trillion spending bill which includes $44.9 billion in assistance for Ukraine.

The bill, covering more than 4,000 pages, was adopted 225-201.

The funding will take US aid to Kyiv during the Russian invasion to more than $100 billion.

See also Ukraine War, Day 303: US Senate Approves $44.9 Billion in Aid for Kyiv


UPDATE 0805 GMT:

The Wall Street Journal has reinforced recent accounts of why Vladimir Putin’s invasion is failing, portraying an isolated leader who was “unable, or unwilling, to believe that Ukraine would successfully resist”.

The report is based on interviews with “several current and former Russian officials and people close to the Kremlin”. It notes that Putin begins each day with a written briefing on the war with information “carefully calibrated to emphasize successes and play down setbacks”. His refusal to use the Internet, fearing digital surveillance, makes him “more dependent on briefing documents compiled by ideologically aligned advisers”.

The blinkered view of the invasion is reinforced by the failure of frontline reports to reach Putin for several days:

Front-line commanders report to the Federal Security Service, or FSB, the successor to the KGB, which edits reports for experts at the Security Council, who pass them to Council Secretary
Nikolai Patrushev, the arch-hawk who helped persuade Mr. Putin to invade Ukraine.

See also How and Why Putin’s Ukraine Invasion Failed


ORIGINAL ENTRY: Europe’s price for gas is at its lowest point since before the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24.

The fall is a blow to Vladimir Putin’s hopes to choke off energy supplies to the continent, seeking to break international support for Kyiv.

The price for 1,000 cubic meters is now about $900 (€843). That compares with forecasts by Russian company Gazprom and former President Dmitry Medvedev in August — with “warm regards” — of $4,000 or even €5,000 this winter.

Over the past week, the price of gas has fallen by almost 30%. At the close of trading on Friday, Dutch TTF futures cost €82.98 per megawatt hour.

On February 23, the eve of the Russian invasion, the TTF price was almost €89 per MWh. On August 26, it peaked at more than €340 per MWh ($3,500 per 1,000 cubic meters).

Through the autumn, European countries built up supply lines, and Germany and the Netherlands opened their first floating liquefied natural gas terminals. Last week, 50 LNG tankers unloaded a 4.4 billion cubic meters, both records. This week another 49 tankers are due to offload almost the same amount of gas.

European gas storage is about 83% full, above the five-year seasonal average, and the chances of mild January are increasing, say analysts at trading firm Energi Danmark A/S.

But Russian State outlet RT is still pushing Putin’s hope of freezing and starving people across Ukraine and Europe this winter and next.