The main event at the front was the liberation of the city of Kherson and the entire Right Bank by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Now Ukrainian troops maintain fire control of three important roads, in particular to Crimea, from where the Russians supply equipment and ammunition. Control over Kherson opens the way to the future liberation of Crimea.

In the first half of November, the dynamics of battles at the front remained unchanged.

Russian troops are beginning to strengthen their defensive positions in the occupied Luhansk, Donetsk, and eastern Zaporizhia regions with personnel from the Kherson region and mobilized servicemen.

Fierce fighting continues on the Svatove-Kreminna line. On November 13, the Armed Forces liberated the village of Makiivka. Russian sources note that the fighting is affected by worsening weather conditions. According to Serhii Gaidai, the head of the Luhansk OVA, the command of the Russian army is transferring the remnants of the best troops to the Luhansk region.

In the Bakhmut, Avdiivka, and Novopavlivka areas, the enemy is concentrating its main efforts on conducting offensive operations. Enemy conducts shelling from tanks and the entire range of artillery. The enemy had partial success in the direction of the settlement of Opytne, which is located directly in front of Avdiivka. Analysts of the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) believe that the transfer of part of the troops to the Donetsk region from the right bank of the Kherson region will probably lead to the intensification of operations around Bakhmut and in the west of the Donetsk region.

In the Zaporizhzhia direction, the occupiers are defending at captured borders.

Russian troops continued to shift part of their forces from the right bank of Dnipro to other operational directions, but still maintain a significant presence of forces in the south of the Kherson region.

In the Kryvyi Rih and Kherson directions, the enemy is conducting positional defense, improving fortification equipment and logistical support of advanced units, and does not stop artillery shelling of Ukrainian positions and settlements on the right bank of the Dnipro River.

In the first half of November, it became known about the transfer of the following weapons to Ukraine:

Spain:

- the battery of the Aspide anti-aircraft missile complex

- four Hawk air defense systems

- anti-tank missile complexes, as well as guns and shells for them

United Kingdom:

- 195,000 thousand units of winter equipment

- 12,000 sleeping sets and 150 heated tents

- 6 CVR(T) armored vehicles (purchased with the funds of the "Poroshenko Foundation")

- 1,000 surface-to-air anti-aircraft missiles

FRG:

- 17 bridge systems

- 22 protected cars Grenzschutzfahrzeuge

- multipurpose crawler excavator "Caterpillar 336-08"

- 30 Dingo armored vehicles

- missiles for Iris-T

- 18 systems of protection against drones and the creation of obstacles

- 18 reconnaissance drones

- 5 M1070 Oshkosh heavy tractors

- 3 loaders.

Greece:

- BMP-1 (Up to 30 announced units)

Finland:

- Mortars 120 KRH 92

Latvia:

- Up to 15 sets of Atlas PRO drones from the Latvian company Atlas Aerospace and 15 cars

Bulgaria:

- ATGL-L grenade launchers

- MG-1M machine guns

Poland:

- high-explosive fragmentation projectiles UO-365-KW

Sweden:

- "Minröjningsorm" demining complexes

USA:

- M58 MICLIC demining complexes

- ATGM BGM-71 TOW

Lithuania:

- 10 self-propelled 120 mm Panzermörser mortars

- marine kamikaze drone (funds collected by citizens of Lithuania)

 

A number of aid packages were also announced: The US aid package provides funding for the modernization of HAWK air defense missiles and their future supply; 45 updated T-72B tanks with improved optics, means of communication and armor packages; 1,100 Phoenix Ghost tactical unmanned aerial systems; 40 armored river boats; Funding for the modernization of 250 M1117 armored vehicles; Tactical protected communication systems and surveillance systems; training, maintenance and support funding. The restoration of 45 Czech T-72B tanks for a total amount of approximately 90 million dollars will be financed by the Netherlands (the funds are a part of aid in the amount of 120 million euros). Thus, in total, Ukraine should receive 90 such tanks. In addition, the Netherlands will allocate 20 million euros to Ukraine through the NATO trust fund and 250 million euros, jointly with Norway, as contribution to the International Fund for Ukraine, which will be led by Great Britain.

Also at the Group of 20 summit, Canada announced the allocation of $500 million in additional military aid.
Source: Mil.ua

On November 11, 2022, the Armed Forces of Ukraine liberated the city of Kherson, the only administrative center that was under the occupation of the Russian Federation. The city, which the Russians officially enshrined in domestic legislation as the territory of the Russian Federation, was important from a military point of view - as a springboard for possible offensive actions on the right bank with the aim of capturing the Black Sea coast and access to Transnistria, and also symbolically - as a city that the Russian propaganda called originally Russian.

An important point is that some experts and government officials who previously did not support the idea of liberating Crimea by military means argued that, according to Russian legislation, Russia considers the peninsula as its own territory, and therefore can use nuclear weapons in the event of its liberation. As the example with Kherson showed, this argument can no longer be relevant.

The liberation of Kherson was a real shock for Russian propaganda and caused hysteria in the Russian information space. Aleksandr Dugin even wrote an ambiguous publication that can be interpreted as a call for the assassination of Vladimir Putin. Dugin blamed the Russian authorities for "surrendering a Russian city, the capital of one of Russia's regions" and declared that the ruler (V. Putin) may face the fate of the "rain king". According to Fraser, if the "rain king" does not live up to the expectations of the people, he will be stoned to death. The publication was later deleted.

The liberation of the city of Kherson created a crack in the political power of the President of Russia and lays the foundation for the further collapse of the Putin regime. Russian society, convinced of the power of its state and the ultimate "joining" of Ukrainian territories, witnessed the surrender of what they consider to be a Russian city. This is happening against the background of mobilization to the ranks of the Russian army, great human losses and in conditions of poor provision of Russian servicemen. Thus, the morale of the Russian army will keep falling, along with faith in the “wise and powerful Tsar”, while failures at the front will lead to an escalation of the struggle between various influential groups.

Currently, among the centers of power in Russian politics, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the "Wagner" PMC, has taken the first roles. With Putin's permission, he actually got the opportunity to create a parallel force structure, his own army, which is not subordinate to the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. After recruiting militants in prisons, instructors associated with "Wagner" began to teach residents of Belgorod and Kursk regions how to handle weapons and tactical medicine. Prigozhin's political influence is evidenced in particular by the attacks of the head of the Wagner Group on Russian elites, statements about the mobilization of the children of oligarchs, and appeals to the Prosecutor General's Office and the FSB with the demand to check the activities of the governor of St. Petersburg, Oleksandr Beglov, regarding treason. Currently, Prigozhin does not pose a threat to Putin's regime. Rather, on the contrary, it is part and protection of it.

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Sources:
Війська РФ перекидають сили на донецький напрямок, щоб відволікти він невдач на Херсонщині – ISW, 15.11.2022,
URL: https://www.radiosvoboda.org/a/news-isw-rf-donbas/32131366.html
Звільнення Херсона: Дугін розкритикував владу РФ та видалив пост. Радник голови МВС України вважає, що це був «заклик вбити Путіна», 11.11.2022,
URL: https://nv.ua/ukr/world/countries/dugin-zaklikav-vbiti-putina-chi-ce-pravda-i-pro-shcho-buv-vidaleniy-post-ostanni-novini-50283346.html
Пригожин вважає, що російська еліта перешкоджає повній мобілізації у рф – ISW, 01.11.2022, URL: https://www.slovoidilo.ua/2022/11/01/novyna/bezpeka/pryhozhyn-vvazhaye-rosijska-elita-pereshkodzhaye-povnij-mobilizacziyi-rf-isw