The Battle of Pokrovsk has been the subject of military reports for several days. For Ukrainian troops, deep fighting on this part of the front line is vital.
Twenty-one months after the Russian offensive on Avdiivka, a suburb of Donetsk, Pokrovsk may now be taken by Russian troops as another logistics hub that will be key to control of Ukraine’s Donetsk region.
Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Pokrovsk had a population of about 60,000 and was an important industrial and transportation node in the Ukrainian-controlled part of Donbass. By the summer of 2025, only about 1,500 people remained.
The battle for the city on the border of the Dnipropetrovsk region has been going on for more than a year. The conflict recently spilled over into the city’s streets.
‘Ticking time bomb’
Rob Lee, a senior fellow in the Eurasia Program at the American Foreign Policy Research Institute, told DW that Pokrovsk is a “big gray area.”
“It is clear that Russian subversion groups are advancing inside the city, to the northwest and north,” Li said. “It is still unclear how much of the entire area they control.” He said Russia had significantly increased its troop presence in the city last week.
According to various estimates, 200 to 300 or even more soldiers may be involved in this. “And the more troops there are in the city,” Lee said, “the more control Russia will have over it.”
Marina Miron, an honorary researcher at the Center for Military Ethics and the Department of Defense Studies at King’s College London, told DW that the main problem for Ukrainian forces in Pokrovsk is Russia’s blocking of key logistics. “Ukrainian troops are being supplied by both aerial and ground drones, because the situation is very dangerous,” Miron said. “If you can’t supply troops or evacuate casualties, it’s like a ticking bomb.”
Has Pokrovsk fallen?
Colonel Markus Reisner, a historian and active in the Austrian armed forces, has analyzed the situation on the Ukrainian front since the beginning of the war. Ukrainian armed forces have not left the city for several reasons, he said.
Reginer told German news channel NTV that Ukraine needed to ensure a new line of defense beyond Pokrovsk and Kostyantnivka. He said Ukraine was trying to gain time by stopping Russia’s advance. Reisner suggested that Pokrovsk had already fallen.
This would have a significant impact on the course of the war. “Pokrovsk is an important city,” Lee said. “Russia has not had any major successes in important cities. But the capture of Pokrovsk will be a major success for Russia in 2025. From a media point of view, the capture of the city by the end of the year will be very important.”
no offensive success
Reisner said that Russia had not yet achieved offensive success on the front line – which was his goal in the summer. However, he said, Kremlin forces had made significant territorial gains.
If Ukraine loses Pokrovsk, military experts say the city will become a central base for Russian troops in the region, as it was for Ukraine. This would give Russia control over an area dotted with tall buildings and dense development, a place where thousands of troops could be stationed. Ukrainian forces, including drone pilots, electronic warfare and reconnaissance units, will have to retreat into wooded areas.
Ukrainian military observer Oleksandr Kovalenko told Reuters news agency that Pokrovsk would be the first “operational-strategic” success for the Russian occupiers since the capture of Avdiivka. Before that, he said, for more than a year, Russia’s successes were mainly of a strategic nature. He said, “Considering the amount of losses and the time spent as well as resources – it is a shame for such a large army.”
Analysts outlined two possible scenarios if Ukrainian forces were forced to evacuate Pokrovsk. Either Vladimir Putin will try to portray this as a victory for Russia in agreeing to talks with Ukraine and the West – or the capture of Pokrovsk will embolden the president to launch further offensive operations. This would mean that other cities in the Donetsk region, such as Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, as well as the neighboring Dnipropetrovsk region could also become targets.
Reisner said Ukraine was attempting to bring Russia to the negotiating table by applying pressure through attacks on strategic targets in the Russian interior. In addition, Ukraine wants to persuade the United States to sell long-range Tomahawk missiles to the armed forces.
Ultimately, despite heavy losses, Putin believes he is on his way to victory, Reisner said.
This article was originally written in Russian.