Russia is currently bombing Kurakhove into nothingness. They are systematically bombing the entire place into dust. Dropping every weapon they have on it. Glide bombs, tactical cruise missiles, artillery, rockets. They are trying to turn it to dust, to completely erase it.

Kurakhove is the anchor to the Ukrainian defensive strategy, it links their eastern line to their southern line. You can think of two concentric circles. There is the outer circle, that is Kurakhove. And the inner circle, that is Kurakhivka. Together they form this anchor.

Between the two is a giant reservoir. Russia is attacking Kurakhivka from the north. They are moving closer and closer to it. And now they are turning Kurakhove to dust.

If you expand this outer circle, Kurakhove is one. You also had Krasnohorivka, and Heorhiivka/Maksimilianivka. Then it expands south to like katerynivka/yelyzavetivka/illinka, and then the furthest extent goes to like novoukrainka, shakhatrske, and eventually velyka novosilka.

the inner circle you had Kurakhivka/hirnyk, zhelanna pershe, halytsynivka, karlivka, zhelanne, hrodivka, and eventually up to like ocheretyne. These two circles are how I thought of this area in my head.

if you look at the two on the map, they kinda form the letter S. but I think of it as concentric circles because their defense kinda reminded me of an onion. You had an outer shell and an inner shell. And what separated them is all of this water. There are reservoirs and rivers

But anyways, My point is that this Russian breakthrough isn't so much threatening to move eastward toward Pokrovsk (which I think would be a minimalist attack from Russia), but rather a way to wrap around and break this outer defense in the south that connects the east and south

People ask why Russia isn't getting big breakthroughs even though they have effectively broken this defensive line: the answer is most likely exhaustion. Their infantry are largely exhausted from 24/7 combat, and their armor has taken huge casualties along the way. Plus ukraine

I think if, by some miracle, Ukraine got together some sort of coherent and functional defensive strategy, they could halt the Russian advance. I am not sure Russia would be able to break through a second time at this point. I think they would grind a few weeks hoping Ukraine

But this is a big if, because Ukraine seemingly hasn't been able to do this. The Russian advance towards Pokrovsk has slowed to a crawl, but I think that is because only a complete fucking idiot would attack Pokrovsk when you have the ability to capture Kurakhivka and

I will interpret any major russian attack on Pokrovsk as them conceding their maximalist aims of this offensive and falling back on a minimalist target.

People keep saying "the lessons learned in Kharkiv" which is a phrase that drives me crazy. But here we see "the lessons learned in Bakhmut." In that Attacking the city (bakhmut/pokrovsk) is what a COMPLETE IDIOT would do, and pushing down to capture vital strong points