Victory Chronicles
-DAY 274

ISW KEY TAKEAWAYS: 2nd HUGE WAVE OF POWER INFRASTRUCTURE STRIKES TAKES OUT LIGHT AND WATER ACROSS UKRAINE; RU LEADERS CALL FOR GENOCIDE

Above: There were deaths in Kyiv as 10 out of 31 enemy missiles fired towards the oblast found targets. (San Diego Tribune)

• The Russian military conducted another set of massive, coordinated missile strikes on Ukrainian critical infrastructure in a misguided attempt to degrade the Ukrainian will to fight.
• Ukrainian Air Force Command reported on November 23 that Russian forces launched 70 cruise missiles and five drones at Ukrainian critical infrastructure targets.
• Ukrainian Air Force Command reported that Ukrainian air defenses shot down 51 of the Russian cruise missiles and all five drones.
• The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces struck residential buildings, thermal power plants, and substations in the city of Kyiv as well as in Kyiv, Vinnytsia, Lviv, and Zaporizhia
• Ukrainian, Russian, and social media sources claimed that Russian forces also struck targets in IvanoFrankivsk, Odesa, Mykolaiv, Kherson, Cherkasy, Dnipropetrovsk, Sumy, Poltava, Kirovohrad, and Kharkiv oblasts.
• Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar stated that Russia’s campaign against critical infrastructure will not weaken the motivation of Ukraine’s civilian population, and the Ukrainian Security and Defense Council Secretary Oleksiy Danilov asserted that Russian missile and drone strikes will not coerce Ukraine into negotiations.
• Prominent Russian politicians continue to promote openly genocidal rhetoric against Ukraine. А Moscow City Duma Deputy and pro-Kremlin journalist posted a long rant to his Telegram channel on November 23 wherein he categorically denied the existence of the Ukrainian nation, relegating Ukrainian identity to a “political orientation.” He called Ukraine a pagan cult of death that worships prisoner executions and called for the total “liquidation of Ukrainian statehood in its current form.”
• This rhetoric is openly exterminatory and dehumanizing and calls for the conduct of a genocidal war against the Ukrainian state and its people, which notably has pervaded discourse in the highest levels of the Russian political mainstream. As ISW has previously reported, Russian President Vladimir Putin has similarly employed such genocidal language in a way that is fundamentally incompatible with calls for negotiations.

Above: Second biggest barrage of missile and drone strikes on critical infrastructure took place yesterday.  Electricity and water outages widespread across the country. LiveMapUA

GENERAL STAFF DAILY ENEMY LOSSES

Above: Oryx

https://www.facebook.com/GeneralStaff.ua

Ukrainian General Staff of the Armed Forces estimated enemy losses for last 24 hours

• Liquidated personnel, 85,720 (+310)
• Tanks, 2,898 (+1)
• Armored personnel vehicles, 5,839 (+7)
• Artillery systems/MLRS, 1,889/395 (+2/0)
• Anti-aircraft warfare systems, 209 (0)
• Aircraft/helicopters, 278/261 (0)
• UAV operational-tactical level, 1,547 (+10)
• Cruise missiles, 531 (+51)
• Warships/boats, 16 (0)
• Vehicles and fuel tanks, 4,400 (+4)
• Special equipment, 161 (0)

CIVILIAN MISSILE STRIKES

Above:  Enemy strikes on across the country left millions without heat and water yesterday. (BBC)

• Over the past day, the enemy launched 5 rocket attacks on populated areas of the Kharkiv and Donetsk oblasts, carried out about 45 attacks from rocket salvo systems on the positions of our troops and towns and villages.
• In the Siverskyi region, in the border areas of the Bryansk and Kursk regions, the enemy continues to conduct demonstration and provocative actions. Fired rocket and barrel artillery in the areas of the settlements of Semenivka in the Chernihiv oblast and Novovasylivka, Kustyne, Druzhba, Vilna Sloboda and Shalygine in the Sumy oblast.
  In the Slobozhansky direction, in the border areas of the Belgorod region, areas of the settlements of Strilech, Hlyboke, Krasne, Izbytske and Ohirtseve of the Kharkiv oblast were shelled.
• In the Kupyansk and Lyman directions, the occupiers are conducting defense, carrying out shelling from tanks and artillery, in particular in the areas of the settlements of Kislivka, Tabaivka, Krokhmalne, Berestove and Vyshneve in the Kharkiv oblast and Novoselivske, Stelmakhivka, Makiivka, Ploshanka, Yampolivka and Bilohorivka in the Luhansk oblast.
• In the Bakhmut and Avdiivka areas, the areas of the settlements of Spirne, Vyimka, Berestove, Soledar, Bakhmutske, Bakhmut, Opytne, Andriyivka, Zelenopillya, Kurdyumivka, Yakovlivka, Klishchiivka, Avdiivka, Vodyane, Pervomaiske, Nevelske and Maryinka were shelled from tanks and the entire spectrum of artillery.
• The enemy is on the defensive in the Novopavlivsk and Zaporizhzhia directions. Shelling of the positions of the Defence Forces and the areas of the settlements of Vuhledar, Prechystivka, Shakhtarske, Velyka Novosilka, Vremivka, Novopil in Donetsk oblast and Zeleny Hay, Dorozhnyanka, Temyrivka, Poltavka, Chervone and Orihiv in the Zaporizhzhia oblast was recorded.
• In the Kryvyi Rih and Kherson directions, the enemy does not stop the artillery shelling of the positions of our troops and settlements on the right bank of the Dnipro River. Used barrel and rocket artillery for shelling the settlements of Maryivka, Dnipropetrovsk oblast; Dudchany, Kachkarivka, Novotyahynka, Tokarivka, Poniativka, Antonivka and Dniprovske of the Kherson oblast and the city of Kherson.

KHARKIV-LUHANSK

Above:  TVP World

Map via ISW

• Russian sources claimed that Ukrainian forces continued counteroffensive operations in the directions of Svatove and Kreminna on November 23.
• The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces neutralized a Russian reconnaissance and sabotage group within 47km northeast of Kharkiv City near Staritsa, Kharkiv Oblast.
• Ukrainian forces continued to target Russian military concentrations and logistics in Luhansk Oblast. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on November 23 that Ukrainian forces struck several Russian manpower and equipment concentrations and destroyed a Russian ammunition depot in Luhansk Oblast in the previous days.
• Russian forces and occupation officials continued the relocation of civilians and the confiscation of private and public Ukrainian property on November 23. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces continued to forcibly resettle Ukrainian residents in Luhansk Oblast under the pretext of eliminating subversive actions and relocated at least 20 locals from Denezhnykove and Shtormove, Luhansk (about 25km northeast of Severodonetsk) to an unknown location.
• Ukrainian Luhansk Oblast Administration Head Serhiy Haidai also reported that Russian forces continued to evict residents from their houses and occupy abandoned homes in Starobilsk Raion, Luhansk.

LUHANSK-DONETSK

Above:  Aljazeera

Map via ISW

• Russian forces continued to conduct offensive operations in the direction of Bakhmut on November 23. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian assaults near Bakhmut, within 14km south of Bakhmut near Kurdiumivka, and within 30km northeast of Bakhmut near Spirne and Berestove
• A Russian milblogger claimed that Wagner Group units are continuing to attempt to push through Ukrainian defensive positions on the outskirts of Bakhmut and that Russian forces conducted assaults within 26km northeast of Bakhmut on Yakovlivka and Bilhorivka, Donetsk Oblast.34 The milblogger also claimed that there is fierce fighting southeast of Soledar (12km northeast of Bakhmut).
• Russian forces continued to conduct offensive operations in the Avdiivka-Donetsk City area on November 23. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Ukrainian forces repelled Russian assaults within 28km southwest of Avdiivka near Krasnohorivka, Pervomaiske, Nevelske, Sieverne, and Marinka, and within 15km northwest of Avdiivka near Novobakhmutivka.
• Russian forces continued to conduct defensive operations in western Donetsk and eastern Zaporizhia oblasts on November 23. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces are on the defensive in these directions.

KHERSON-ZAPORIZHZHYA

Above: In Kherson

Map via ISW

• Russian forces continued defensive operations on the east (left) bank of Kherson Oblast on November 23. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian troops in the Kherson direction are conducting positional defense, improving fortifications, and deploying additional equipment to defensive lines along the M14 (Kakhovka-Melitopol) highway.
• Russian forces reportedly struck Kherson City with incendiary munitions on November 23.
• Ukrainian forces continued striking Russian concentration areas in Zaporizhia Oblast on November 23. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that a Ukrainian strike destroyed a Russian S-300 surface-to-air missile system near Orikhiv, a checkpoint near Vesele, and a personnel concentration in Melitopol between November 21 and 23.
• Ukrainian Mariupol City advisor Andryushchenko reported that Russian occupying forces check schoolchildren’s belongings before the schoolchildren enter school and require them to sing the Russian and Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) anthems every morning.
• The Ukrainian Resistance Center reported that occupation officials in Melitopol erected a monument in mid-November to Grigory Boyarinov, a Russian war hero and People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD) employee. The Ukrainian Resistance Center reported on November 23 that Melitopol residents painted the monument black in protest.
• Ukrainian nuclear power company Energoatom announced on November 23 that due to a decrease in the availability of energy supply in Ukraine, the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) went into full blackout mode and that all diesel generators are in operation.
• Energoatom’s statement is underscored by discussions between International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi and Rosatom Director General Alexey Likhachev in Istanbul, Turkey, to establish a nuclear safety and security protection zone around the ZNPP.
• Russian officials will likely continue to conduct an information operation accusing Ukraine of endangering the ZNPP in order to undermine attempts at negotiations with the IAEA and consolidate Russian control of the plant.
• Zaporizhia Oblast Occupation Head Yevheny Balitsky notably reported that Zaporizhia occupation authorities plan to carry out extensive nationalization of socially significant Ukrainian objects and infrastructure in Zaporizhia Oblast. This plan essentially legalizes the looting of Ukrainian property, consolidates administrative control of occupied areas, and contributes to the erosion of Ukrainian identity and culture by subsuming socially-significant infrastructure into Russian systems.