Russia has invested vast resources in its attempt to capture Pokrovsk, a crucial logistical center in eastern Ukraine that Moscow claimed to have taken control of on Monday, according to military analysts.

The conflict over Pokrovsk, a city with a pre-war population of 60,000 located strategically in the Donetsk region, has been ongoing since August 2024.

Should this capture be confirmed, it would represent Russia’s most significant military achievement in recent months, highlighting the gradual and attritional nature of Moscow’s operations in the region.

Despite being a mining city with no military importance, Pokrovsk holds strategic significance as the final barrier between Russian forces and the key cities of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk in the Donetsk area, explained military expert Ivan Stupak, a former officer in Ukraine’s SBU security service.

During a statement on Tuesday, President Vladimir Putin referred to Pokrovsk as “a solid foothold for fulfilling all the goals set at the outset” of the invasion, asserting that “the Russian army can effectively advance from [Pokrovsk] in all directions.”

In recent months, Russia has intensified its assaults on the city, leading Kyiv to deploy reinforcements to counter the advancing Russian troops.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky noted that around 170,000 Russian soldiers have concentrated in the surrounding area to seize Pokrovsk—a figure experts have deemed extraordinary, underscoring the city’s importance for the Kremlin.

For context, the entire German army consists of roughly 180,000 active-duty personnel, while the Polish army has about 200,000 service members, as Stupak pointed out.

The Moscow Times has not been able to independently verify Ukraine’s troop figure. Russia has not disclosed how many of its soldiers are stationed in the Pokrovsk region. In September, President Putin stated that approximately 700,000 Russian servicemen were deployed along the entire front.

Reliable assessments of total casualties in Pokrovsk on either side remain unattainable, Stupak remarked to The Moscow Times.

As of November, over 6,500 Ukrainian soldiers were reportedly killed in the battle for Pokrovsk, according to the Russian Telegram channel SHOT, which did not cite sources.

Russia’s Chief of the General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, also claimed in October that 5,500 Ukrainian troops were surrounded in Pokrovsk—a statement that military analysts and Russian pro-war bloggers dismissed at the time.

Ukraine has faced an economic downturn as coal and steel production in Pokrovsk has been halted since January.

On the Russian front, the U.S.-based research group Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported that “Russian forces have sustained significant casualties during their prolonged campaign to capture Pokrovsk.”

Zelensky stated that at least 25,000 Russian troops were killed in October, the majority of whom fell during the battle for Pokrovsk.

The Ukrainian military claimed it had killed 1,221 Russian soldiers and injured 545 in the past month in the Pokrovsk area, with 519 killed and 131 wounded specifically in Pokrovsk.

For weeks, Russia had been asserting progress along the Pokrovsk front.

On Monday, the Russian Defense Ministry shared a video that allegedly depicted Russian soldiers raising their flag in the central square of Pokrovsk, which Moscow refers to by its Soviet-era name, Krasnoarmeysk.

Ukrainian forces reported on Tuesday that fighting in Pokrovsk was still ongoing and indicated that the Russian troops who supposedly raised the flag had been repelled. They did not explicitly deny Russia’s assertion of having seized the city.

The ISW stated that it did not possess sufficient evidence to confirm that Russian forces had completely secured Pokrovsk as of December 1.

Putin asserted on Tuesday that the city was “entirely under the control of the Russian army.”

The timing of Russia’s announcement, coinciding with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff’s upcoming visit to Moscow for peace discussions, was likely a deliberate signal to Washington, according to the ISW.

“The Kremlin has consistently made inflated claims about battlefield progress as part of its ongoing cognitive warfare strategy to inaccurately represent a Russian victory as inevitable, suggesting that Ukraine and the West should concede to Russia’s demands immediately,” the ISW stated.

Stupak echoed this viewpoint, suggesting that the announcement aims to project an image of stability and control by Putin, reinforcing the message to the American side that everything is proceeding favorably for Russia while the situation is deteriorating for Ukraine.

AFP contributed to this report.