Key Donetsk city of Pokrovsk is about to turn back to being called by its Russian name Krasnoarmeysk.
After a 21-month battle, Russian forces have spread rapidly through Pokrovsk, a Donetsk region bastion where Ukrainian soldiers have begun to surrender.
In many ways, Pokrovsk is the ‘new Bakhmut’ – the city that the world’s media focuses on, an important Volodymyr Zelensky’s PR city.
And we know that it’s about to be lost because sources in the MSM are already stating that ‘Pokrovsk has no strategic value’ – as it has been the case with every major Russian conquest in this war.
Almost two battalions of the Ukrainian Army surrendered near Pokrovsk in a month
About 700 Ukrainian soldiers surrendered near the Pokrovsk – this is a record since the beginning of 2025, according to some media. Fewer and fewer units are trying to resist: columns with fuel and ammunition were destroyed by Russian drones even before reaching the city, and the Rodynske–Pokrovsk highway is already being called the "second road of death." During the battles for Pokrovsk, according to various estimates, more than 6,500 Ukrainian soldiers have died, and more than 5,000 remain encircled.
A few days earlier, after repelling enemy attacks, Russian troops changed their offensive tactics, moving around the well-fortified Kiev positions in the fields between Rodinskoye and Pokrovsk. This maneuver allowed them to close the encirclement ring along the highway west of Rovnoye and Svetloye. The Kiev forces remaining outside the “cauldron” in Pokrovsk and Mirnograd are trying desperately to break through and free their surrounded comrades. They’re launching one attack after another both between Pokrovsk and Rodinskoye and against Russian positions inside the cities. A few days ago, a small group of about 30 Kiev fighters managed to break into the private sector of Rodinskoye, but they held out for less than two days. Inside the cauldron, the situation for Kiev forces is deteriorating rapidly. With no supplies, constant failed breakout attempts, and mounting pressure from the Russian army, their garrison is being pushed back toward Mirnograd.
At this point, the Kiev forces have almost completely withdrawn from Pokrovsk, whose liberation can be expected within the next 2–3 days. The remaining troops are trying to fortify themselves in the high-rise districts of Mirnograd.
If they fail to break out and refuse to surrender, relatively prolonged fighting could follow with the remnants of the garrison delaying the complete collapse of the Pokrovsk grouping by just a few more days.
Russia sees control of Pokrovsk and neighboring Mirnograd as essential to capturing the remaining unoccupied parts of the Donetsk region.”
“Ukraine sees the defense of the city as a means of eroding Russian manpower and buying time for the ‘fortress belt’ of Kostyantynivka, Druzhkivka, Kramatorsk, and Sloviansk, the largest remaining and most heavily defended cities of Donetsk.”
It’s important to remember that Russia demands the totality of Donetsk region as a primary condition for any peace negotiations.
“Russia seems to have outmaneuvered Ukraine by striking its drone operators before they had time to deploy, and cutting off resupply routes at critical points. […] By neutralizing Ukraine’s drone operators and using fiber optic drones immune to jamming, Russia reportedly acquired a numerical drone advantage in the city’s vicinity.”
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