Overstretched Russian forces may lack the mechanized reserve to thwart Ukraine establishing a bridgehead on the Dnipro River, report says

• A "mechanized" Russian counterattack may threaten Ukraine's advanced position, a think tank said.
• The Institute for the Study of War said it was unclear if Russia had the necessary reserves.

Russia's overstretched forces may lack the mechanized reserves to successfully thwart a Ukrainian bridgehead across the Dnipro River, a report by the Institute for the Study of War says.

The US think tank said that "an effective Russian mechanized counterattack could threaten" Ukraine's advanced position but that it was "unclear if Russian forces possess the mechanized reserves necessary to do so."

In a thread on X, the think tank broke down the latest situation in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, noting that "Russian mil bloggers acknowledged that Ukrainian forces are maintaining a presence on the east (left) bank of the Dnipro river in Kherson Oblast."

But the think tank said it did not believe Ukraine had yet established a bridgehead. A bridgehead across the waterway from the recaptured city of Kherson on the southern section of the 750-mile front line would put Ukrainian forces in a position to contemplate an advance toward Russian-occupied Crimea — and split the Russian invasion force in two.

It also said that "continuing Russian claims that Ukrainian forces maintain a presence on the east bank of the Dnipro River suggest that Russian forces are concerned that they have established semi-lasting positions across the river."

The Institute said it was keeping a "conservative assessment" of the movements in the Kherson oblast, and it was waiting for "visual confirmation of an enduring Ukrainian presence on the east bank" of the region.

Ukraine has been enjoying some success of late in warfare along the river, with its special forces breaking through Russian defensive lines and capturing or killing some enemy soldiers in a raid across the Dnipro River, as Insider previously reported.

But Michael Clarke, a defense expert and a professor at King's College London, told Sky News that the raid seemed to be "more of a distraction than anything else."

"The biggest breach they've made is south of Zaporizhzhia. They've got another one in Bakhmut, and another at Velyka Novosilka further south — so they've got at least four breaches," Clarke said.

"They are going to try to go through one or more rather quickly," he added.