Where is Bakhmut, and what was it like before the war?

Bakhmut is a city in the eastern region of Donetsk, more than 400 miles southeast of Kyiv and 10 miles from the border of the Luhansk region. The industrial city, with a prewar population of some 71,000, was known for its salt and gypsum mines. It’s also the site of a winery established on the order of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin in 1950, which for decades produced the Soviet Union’s top-flight sparkling wine, before rebranding when Ukraine gained independence in 1991. Bakhmut has been caught up in conflict since 2014, when Russian-backed separatists launched a push to capture Donetsk. The separatists briefly seized parts of the city that year, before Ukrainian forces drove them out. In 2016, residents changed the city’s Soviet-era name, Artemivsk, back to the historical name of Bakhmut, which dates to 1571, when it was a Cossack settlement. The city is located southeast of Kramatorsk, a major regional hub and administrative center in the Donbas region, which includes Donetsk and Luhansk. After the Kremlin launched its invasion of Ukraine last year, Bakhmut came under shelling in May, as part of Russia’s effort to encircle Ukrainian forces in Donetsk and Luhansk. Moscow has said it aims to capture the entirety of the two regions, which are among those it claimed in September to have annexed. Since then, the war has transformed Bakhmut into a burned-out husk. Only several thousand residents remain, many of them elderly. In December, Zelensky said Russian forces had turned the city into “burned ruins.”

Why is Bakhmut important?

Bakhmut was “not a particularly symbolically or strategically important city” originally, said Karolina Hird, Russia analyst at the Institute for the Study of War. It’s more than 30 miles from the closest major cities, Kramatorsk and Slovyansk. But it caught the eye of Yevgeniy Prigozhin, head of the Wagner Group , known for its brutal tactics and interventions in conflicts in Africa and Syria. Prigozhin poured tens of thousands of mercenaries, many recruited from Russian prisons, into Bakhmut — showing remarkable willingness to sacrifice these fighters for incremental territorial gains. Wagner commanders have sent wave after wave of often poorly trained ex-convicts toward Ukrainian positions, with many ending up killed or wounded. For Prigozhin, the battle represents a chance to showcase Wagner’s abilities — even at enormous human cost — as he jockeys with Russia’s military chiefs for influence. Paradoxically, analysts say, the city has also taken on outsize political importance for both sides in part because the fighting has been so intense there. Since Ukrainian forces mounted successful counteroffensives in the fall, retaking territory, the overall fighting has largely stagnated along a 600-mile front line . Bakhmut is one of the only places where Russian forces have made new gains. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on Tuesday described Bakhmut as “an important defense node for Ukrainian forces” in the east. “Taking it under control will make it possible to conduct further offensives deep into the Ukrainian armed forces’ defenses,” he said in a statement. For Ukrainians, Bakhmut has become an emblem of resistance. The slogan “Bakhmut holds” is a rallying cry. When Zelensky visited Bakhmut in December, he called the besieged city “the fortress of our morale.” The next day, during a surprise trip to Washington, Zelensky presented a flag from Bakhmut to Congress, and compared the battle to a turning point in the American Revolution. “Just like the Battle for Saratoga, the fight for Bakhmut will change the trajectory of our war for independence and for freedom,” he told U.S. lawmakers.

How has the battle developed?

Since September, Bakhmut has often seemed to be on the brink of falling, and Ukrainian officials have emphasized that the heaviest fighting is being waged there. But Ukrainian troops clung on through a cold winter , lobbing artillery at Russian forces. In recent weeks, fighting has intensified, with Russian forces stepping up attacks and seeking to encircle Bakhmut and the remaining Ukrainian troops there. Last Friday, Prigozhin said his fighters had “practically surrounded” the city — and on Wednesday, he claimed they had taken control of the “entire eastern part” of Bakhmut. The Washington Post was not able to verify the latest claims, and Prigozhin has a history of prematurely claiming victories. The Ukrainian military’s General Staff said in a statement Wednesday that its forces had repelled more than 100 Russian attacks around Bakhmut and other parts of Donetsk over the past day. As of Tuesday, Ukrainian forces had retained control of a key road out of Bakhmut. Prigozhin on Tuesday repeated his calls, in a video posted to Telegram, for Russia’s Defense Ministry to send his men more ammunition, comparing the battle for Bakhmut to killing a bear and saying it would take time. Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov attended a meeting with E.U. defense ministers in Stockholm on Wednesday to make a similar request of Ukraine’s allies. In Bakhmut, the battle has become a “grinding urban conflict of basically Wagner groups trying to force themselves into the center of the city, block by block,” Hird said. Ukrainian soldiers said that at times, they are engaging in hand-to-hand combat with the Russians. Zelensky said last month that Ukraine would maintain a hold on Bakhmut, but “not at any cost.” “Our military is obviously going to weigh all of the options. So far, they’ve held the city, but, if need be, they will strategically pull back,” Alexander Rodnyansky, an economic adviser to Zelensky, told CNN this week. But Zelensky’s top military commanders advised this week that Ukraine double down on defending the city, his office said in a statement Monday. In excerpts of an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, slated to air Wednesday, Zelensky pushed back on the notion that Bakhmut’s importance was largely symbolic. “This is tactical for us,” he said, adding, “It would be open road for the Russians after Bakhmut to other towns in Ukraine, in the Donetsk direction.”

What could a Russian victory in Bakhmut mean?

If Russian forces drive Ukrainian troops out of Bakhmut, it would represent a rare military victory for them in recent months, and a symbolic win for the Kremlin. Within Russia, that outcome could provide a boost to the status of the Wagner Group and Prigozhin. Already, the Wagner fighters’ plodding progress in Bakhmut has allowed Prigozhin to “very successfully increase his own standing” with Russian military commanders, Hird said. In terms of strategic value, however, analysts say such a victory would be pyrrhic. The city itself is essentially destroyed. A win could give the Russians a launching point for a push northwest along the E40 highway to Slovyansk, or north to the town of Siversk. But Russian forces have tried and failed to take these cities in the past. And the Ukrainians have dug fallback defenses in nearby communities, likely to make any Russian advance difficult. “The two paths of advance that taking Bakhmut might open up for them aren’t really good options,” Hird said. U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in remarks Monday that if Ukraine pulls out of Bakhmut, it would not change the broader conflict. Even if Ukraine withdraws, it has already succeeded in wearing down Russian forces and their Wagner colleagues. The White House recently estimated that about 30,000 Wagner fighters have been injured or killed in the months-long battle. The staggering losses and resources spent could make it harder for Moscow to mount an effective defense in the south, where Ukraine is probably preparing to launch a spring counteroffensive, Hird said. David Herszenhorn, Natalia Abbakumova, Robyn Dixon, Siobhán O’Grady and Adela Suliman contributed to this report.

World

Why Russia and Ukraine are fighting over Bakhmut

By Claire Parker

Updated March 8, 2023 at 11:12 a.m. EST|Published March 3, 2023 at 11:33 a.m. EST

Smoke and destruction in Bakhmut, Ukraine, on Feb. 27. (AFP/Getty Images)

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8 min

If there’s one city that has come to symbolize the grinding war of attrition in Ukraine, it’s Bakhmut.

Russia has pummeled the city for about eight months, reducing it to a charred ghost town. Moscow has sent wave after wave of soldiers and Wagner Group mercenaries toward Ukrainian positions, sustaining heavy casualties in the process. At several points, as Russian forces close in, the city has appeared on the verge of falling. But Ukrainian fighters have stood their ground.

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Before the war, Bakhmut was mostly known as a center of the salt industry. But the relentless, intensifying fight for control of the city — which analysts say holds little strategic importance — has made it a rallying cry and political battleground for both sides.

The situation there is the “most difficult” in the country, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said last week — but he vowed Monday night not to withdraw from Bakhmut, adding that senior military commanders supported reinforcing the city.

Moscow could soon take control of the city, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Wednesday. But such a scenario “does not necessarily reflect any turning point of the war, and it just highlights that we should not underestimate Russia,” he told reporters ahead of a meeting with European Union defense ministers.

Here’s what to know about the battle for the city.

Russia advances in Bakhmut by sending waves of mercenaries to certain death

One year of Russia’s war in Ukraine

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Battle of attrition: Over the past year, the war has morphed from a multi-front invasion that included Kyiv in the north to a conflict of attrition largely concentrated along an expanse of territory in the east and south. Follow the 600-mile front line between Ukrainian and Russian forces and take a look at where the fighting has been concentrated.

A year of living apart: Russia’s invasion, coupled with Ukraine’s martial law preventing fighting-age men from leaving the country, has forced agonizing decisions for millions of Ukrainian families about how to balance safety, duty and love, with once-intertwined lives having become unrecognizable. Here’s what a train station full of goodbyes looked like last year.

Deepening global divides: President Biden has trumpeted the reinvigorated Western alliance forged during the war as a “global coalition,” but a closer look suggests the world is far from united on issues raised by the Ukraine war. Evidence abounds that the effort to isolate Putin has failed and that sanctions haven’t stopped Russia, thanks to its oil and gas exports.