This interactive time-lapse complements static control-of-terrain maps that ISW produces by showing a dynamic frontline.
ISW’s daily campaign assessments of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, including our static maps, are available at understandingwar.org
Time-lapse of Assessed Control of Terrain in Ukraine,
February 23rd, 2022, to February 28th, 2023
On 24 February 2022, Russia invaded and occupied parts of Ukraine in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides and instigated Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. About 8 million Ukrainians were displaced within their country by June, and more than 8.1 million had fled the country by March 2023.
After months of Russian officials denying plans to attack Ukraine, Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February 2022 upon Russian President Vladimir Putin's announcement of a "special military operation" seeking the "demilitarisation" and "denazification" of Ukraine. In his address, Putin espoused irredentist views, challenged Ukraine's right to statehood, and falsely claimed that Ukraine was governed by neo-Nazis who persecuted the ethnic Russian minority. Minutes later, Russian air strikes and a ground invasion were launched along a northern front from Belarus towards Kyiv, a north-eastern front towards Kharkiv, a southern front from Crimea, and a south-eastern front from Donetsk and Luhansk. In response, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy enacted martial law and a general mobilisation.
Russian troops retreated from the northern front by April. On the southern and south-eastern fronts, Russia captured Kherson in March and then Mariupol in May after a siege. On 18 April, Russia launched a renewed battle of Donbas. Russian forces continued to bomb both military and civilian targets far from the front line, including electrical and water systems. In late 2022, Ukraine launched counteroffensives in the south and in the east. Soon after, Russia announced the illegal annexation of four partly occupied oblasts.In November, Ukraine retook Kherson. On 7 February 2023, Russia mobilised nearly 200,000 soldiers for a renewed offensive towards Bakhmut.
The invasion has been met with widespread international condemnation. The United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution ES-11/1 condemning the invasion and demanding a full withdrawal of Russian forces. The International Court of Justice ordered Russia to suspend military operations and the Council of Europe expelled Russia. Many countries imposed sanctions on Russia, and on its ally Belarus, and provided humanitarian and military aid to Ukraine. Protests occurred around the world; those in Russia were met with mass arrests and increased media censorship. Over 1,000 companies left Russia and Belarus in response to the invasion. The International Criminal Court (ICC) opened an investigation into possible crimes in Ukraine since 2013, including possible crimes against humanity, war crimes, abduction of children, and genocide during the invasion, ultimately issuing an arrest warrant for Putin in March 2023.
The Institute for the Study of War and the Critical Threats Project methodology for mapping conventional maneuver war
relies on standard US military doctrinal definitions of tactical mission tasks as well as centuries-old conventions for
displaying conventional military operations on terrain. The approach to mapping conventional maneuver war is very
different from that used to depict insurgency, for reasons we will consider presently. The difference can make our maps of
the current war in Ukraine appear jarring to those familiar with our approach and others’ to mapping insurgencies over the
past two decades.
The key point is that control in the context of mechanized conventional war is very different from control in the context of insurgency or
counter-insurgency. When mapping insurgencies, we rely on definitions of control and other terms that include assessments
of the state of competing efforts to establish governance, since government legitimacy is at the heart of any
counterinsurgency.
The United States and international community recognize only one legitimate government in Ukraine, that seated in Kyiv
according to the Ukrainian Constitution and currently headed by President Volodymyr Zelensky. The Russian invasion is
an attempt to replace that government by conventional military force. The ISW and CTP depictions of areas of Russian
control do not in any way suggest Russian governance of those areas or the loss of the legitimacy of the
internationally-recognized Ukrainian government among populations in those areas, as control maps of an
insurgency would imply. They simply depict our best assessments of the forward line of Russian troops as of the data-cutoff
time for each map.
The Russo-Ukrainian War: Every Day.
#ukrainewar #russia #ukraine
27 мар 2023
