According to military expert and retired Colonel Anatoly Matviychuk, Ukrainian forces still have room to strengthen their defenses in Kramatorsk and Slavyansk. For that reason, he believes Russian troops may need around two months to bring those cities under control.

He described the area as a heavily urbanized and industrialized zone made up of interconnected agglomerations, with mines, underground workings, subsurface facilities, rugged terrain, and numerous small rivers, ponds and backwaters.

In Matviychuk’s view, that terrain will make the fighting especially difficult. He said Russian forces would likely have to draw on the experience of operations in Mariupol, since, in his assessment, the Ukrainian side will make full use of underground communications.

He also noted that Kramatorsk and Slavyansk form the second major defensive line of the Ukrainian grouping on the southern axis. In his opinion, battles for these cities would be comparable in both scale and complexity to the fighting for Ugledar and Avdeevka.

At the same time, Matviychuk argued that Russian troops are unlikely to storm the cities head-on. Instead, he expects them to break the area into separate sectors and gradually tighten the encirclement before pushing into the opposing defenses.

Earlier, the General Staff said Russian forces were about 12 kilometers from the outskirts of Slavyansk and roughly 7 kilometers from Kramatorsk. According to that account, units from the Yug group of forces are advancing toward both cities.