ISW Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, July 17, 2024

Key Takeaways from the ISW:

• Russian state news outlets editorialized comments by Russian Security Council Deputy Chairperson Dmitry Medvedev and claimed that he said that the Ukrainian state will no longer exist by 2034, likely to support the Kremlin's efforts to prepare the Russian public for a long war in Ukraine while promising that Russia will complete its objective to destroy Ukrainian statehood within a decade.
• Russian officials continue to seize on diplomatic meetings with European states to create the impression that Russia is normalizing its relations with the West and claim that there is limited Western support for Russia.
• Russia and India continue to strengthen their bilateral relationship amid reports of ongoing Russian weapons exports to India.
• Russia and Ukraine exchanged 95 prisoners of war (POWs) each in a one-to-one POW exchange on July 17.
• Kremlin officials continue attempts to curry favor with Russian ultranationalists by appealing to anti-migrant animus despite such appeals generating tensions with the Russian government’s efforts to execute the Kremlin's wider migration policy.
• Ukrainian forces regained positions south of Toretsk, and Russian forces recently advanced north of Kharkiv City and near Kupyansk, Svatove, Avdiivka, and Vuhledar.
• Russia's crypto-mobilization campaign continues to generate increasing financial costs for the Russian government.

Authors: Riley Bailey, Angelica Evans, Grace Mappes, Christina Harward, and Frederick W. Kagan.

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