Ukraine intensified attacks against the Russian military, logistics, and other high-profile assets in rear areas in occupied Ukraine and Russia, ISW reported.
On 12 November, the Ukrainian Main Military Intelligence Directorate (GUR) reported that Ukrainian partisans attacked a Russian military headquarters in occupied Melitopol, Zaporizhzhia Oblast. Its attack on 11 November killed at least three Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) and Rosgvardia officers.
According to Ukraine’s Intelligence report, representatives of the resistance movement blew up the Russian-occupied premises of the “Nova Poshta” (Ukraine’s largest privately-owned postal service) in the Russian-occupied Melitopol during a meeting of the Russian occupiers, FSB and Russian National Guard officers there.
According to the Institute for the Study of War, a US-based think tank, the GUR’s announcement follows a Ukrainian partisan attack against a former Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) People’s Militia head on 8 November; strikes against a Russian military base in occupied Skadovsk, Kherson Oblast and Black Sea Fleet assets in Crimea on 9 November; and three rear-area strikes and partisan attacks in Russia on 11 November.
Ukrainian forces have conducted a strike campaign specifically targeting occupied Crimea since summer 2023.
In an interview with Radio Liberty in August, the head of the Defense Ministry’s Main Intelligence Directorate, Kyrylo Budanov, said that Ukrainian forces are able to reach any point in occupied Crimea to defeat the enemy. According to him, there are many different options for the de-occupation of Crimea, but “it is impossible without military action.”
Other takeaways from the ISW report:
- The Russian government is attempting to downplay the extent of its efforts to strengthen control over the Russian information space.
- Russia continues to posture itself as a prominent security guarantor for authoritarian countries in Africa.
- Russian forces conducted a limited series of missile strikes targeting southern Ukraine on 12 November.
- Russian forces continued offensive operations along the Kupiansk-Kreminna line, near Bakhmut, in the Donetsk-Zaporizhzhia Oblast border area, and in western Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
- Ukrainian forces made a marginal gain on the east (left) bank of Kherson Oblast on November 12 amid ongoing ground operations.
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