President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that Ukraine’s top generals had promised to continue defending Bakhmut in the east as Russian forces battled to tighten their siege and win their first significant battlefield victory in more than six months.
Russian forces claim that seizing Bakhmut would be a step towards their goal of occupying the entire surrounding Donbas region. They have been attempting to seize Bakhmut for months. Yet, considering the amount of time and damage did, Western strategists claim that it would be more of a pyrrhic victory.
Conditions in and around Bakhmut
As the head of the Wagner mercenary group exacerbated more tensions with Russian military commanders, a Ukrainian military commander described the conditions in and around Bakhmut as “hellish,” but he and others pledged to continue the costly battle for the eastern city.
In Bakhmut, which has been subjected to months of savage warfare that has resulted in numerous fatalities on both sides, Ukraine has vowed to keep defending the area.
According to the report, fires were started, cars and homes were damaged, and heavy shelling in the adjoining towns of Chasiv Yar and Kostyantynivka caused fires. Volunteers and police were assisting with the evacuation of residents from the front lines, but the situation was dangerous due to bridge damage and constant Russian artillery fire.
The Center for the Study of War in Washington reported that while Ukrainian defensive measures had significantly depleted Russian military supplies, Kyiv’s forces may now be conducting a “gradual combat withdrawal” from some areas
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the president of Ukraine, met with Valeriy Zaluzhniy, the head of the armed forces, and Oleksandr Syrskiy, the head of the ground forces, on March 6. During their meeting, “they spoke in favor of continuing the defensive operation and further strengthening our positions in Bakhmut,” according to the president’s website.
Zelenskiy acknowledged recently that the battle for the eastern Donbas region is “painful and challenging,” and the Ukrainian General Staff stated in its regular battlefield update on March 6 that Russia was focusing its main efforts on offensives in the areas around Bakhmut, Avdiyivka, Lyman, and Shakhtarsk in Donetsk as well as further north in Kupyansk, in the Kharkiv region.
It asserted that in a few of the most intense battle zones, it had successfully repelled more than 95 enemy strikes.
The enemy “is continuing its attempted assault on the town of Bakhmut and nearby communities,” according to the Military Staff, which cited bombardment in more than a dozen Donetsk municipalities.
To “mislead” the Ukrainian side, the Russian military, according to the Ukrainian military, has been shifting columns between Kherson in the southeast and the annexed Crimea.
Due to “a lack of sufficient fuel and even any hint of the effectiveness of such operations,” it claimed, the feint was “creating resentment” among Russian servicemen.
Russia’s attacks in the area demanded more ammunition
On March 6, there were fresh indications of unrest in Moscow when the head of the Wagner private military organization, which has been in charge of the majority of Russia’s attacks in the area, demanded more ammunition while lamenting the fact that one of his aides had been denied access to the military’s operational headquarters.
“I informed the SMO grouping commander in a letter dated March 5 that ammunition allocation was an immediate necessity. My representative at the headquarters had his card revoked and was denied admission on March 6 at 8 a.m “Via his press service on Telegram, Yevgeny Prigozhin, who has been requesting more ammo for weeks, stated.
For the time being, Prigozhin remarked, “We are attempting to determine the cause: is it just routine bureaucracy or a betrayal.”
A week earlier, Prigozhin, who has long been regarded as close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, claimed that Russian fighters were closing their “pincers” around Bakhmut.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin downplayed Bakhmut’s significance during a Middle East visit on March 6, calling it more “symbolic” than anything else and hesitating to predict that it would eventually fall to Russian forces.
Sergei Shoigu, the Russian defense minister, was determined to convey assurance in a rumored trip to eastern Ukraine to meet with senior commanders and assess the situation, which was relayed in numerous Defense Ministry announcements over the weekend and again on March 6.
According to the ministry, Shoigu traveled to Mariupol, a city in southeast Ukraine that was finally taken last year following a protracted siege.
Belarus claims to have apprehended a sabotage gang that attacked Russian aircraft close to Minsk.
In response to an attempted sabotage of a Belarusian airfield, Belarus apprehended what it claimed was a Ukrainian “terrorist group” working with Kyiv’s intelligence agencies on Tuesday,
To renew the Black Sea grain agreement, Ukraine begins the online conversation but has not yet spoken with Russia directly.
According to a senior Ukrainian government source, Ukraine has begun online negotiations with partners to extend the Black Sea Grain Initiative, which will allow Kyiv to continue transporting grain to international markets.
According to the source, Russia, which blocked Ukrainian Black Sea ports after annexing the country last year, and Ukraine have not spoken, but Kyiv believes that its allies are in communication with Moscow.