Military analysts point to activity of russia in Kursk Oblast, associated with attempts to displace AFU until weather worsens

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reports that russian forces stepped up counterattacks in russia's Kursk Oblast on October 10 and 11 to try to dislodge Ukrainian forces before worsening weather conditions limit their maneuverability on the battlefield.

The ISW project analyzed reports from russian military bloggers about increased attacks and alleged russian advances near a number of settlements in the Kursk Oblast.

At the same time, ISW emphasizes that the analysts themselves have not seen any confirmation of the claims about the alleged advance of the russians in the Sudzha District, or the alleged expulsion of Ukrainian forces from most of the Glushkovsky District on October 10 and 11, or the alleged encirclement of Ukrainian troops in the Korenevsky District in the Kursk Oblast.

"Intensified Russian counterattacks likely aim to push Ukrainian forces out of Kursk Oblast before poor weather conditions in Fall 2024 and early Winter 2024-2025 begin to constrain battlefield maneuver. Ukrainian officials have previously noted that Russian forces are intensifying offensive operations in Ukraine, particularly mechanized offensive operations, to take advantage of dry road and terrain conditions before rainy seasonal weather causes muddy ground conditions. It is likely that this Russian operational calculus also extends to the Russian effort to recapture all of Kursk Oblast, where several Russian sources have reported the start of limited muddy terrain conditions as of October 11," analysts note.

ISW predicts that the russian military command may be concerned that bad weather conditions in the fall of 2024 and the beginning of the winter of 2024-2025 will contribute to positional battles in the Kursk Oblast and give Ukrainian forces more time to better consolidate their positions.

"Better-entrenched Ukrainian forces with more extensive fortifications in Kursk Oblast will likely further complicate Russian efforts to push Ukrainian forces back across the border. Russian forces may perceive a closing window of opportunity to eliminate the Ukrainian incursion into Kursk Oblast with the current level of manpower and materiel that the Russian military has allocated to the effort," the analysts write.

ISW recalls that the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Oleksandr Syrskyi previously stated that since the beginning of the Kursk operation on August 6, russian forces have redeployed about 50,000 servicemen from other operational directions to the Kursk Oblast, and that the russian military command is likely to avoid redeploying more personnel to the region in case the Ukrainian presence is maintained until 2025.

He also emphasized that such redeployments probably weakened russian troops in the Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, and Kharkiv Regions.

Analysts believe that the russian military command is likely to seek to quickly oust Ukrainian forces from the Kursk Oblast in order to free up combat power to carry out offensive operations prioritized by the russians on the Pokrovsk axis and in the western part of the Donetsk Region.

"Russian forces have yet to make rapid gains in Kursk Oblast since starting counterattacks on September 10, however, and intensified counterattacks threaten to exhaust and degrade the very combat power that the Russian military hopes to recommit to the priority offensive operations in Donetsk Oblast," ISW concludes.