US intelligence expects slower pace of Ukraine war to continue

Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines also said Russia’s precision munitions appear to be running out quickly.

The slowed pace of fighting in Ukraine is set to continue over the next several months and the United States sees no evidence that Ukraine’s will to resist Russia has diminished, despite Moscow’s crippling attacks on the Ukrainian power grid, a senior US intelligence official said.

Avril Haines, director of national intelligence in the Biden administration, also said on Saturday that she believed Russian President Vladimir Putin had been surprised that his military had not achieved more in its war on Ukraine.

“We’re seeing a kind of a reduced tempo already of the conflict … and we expect that’s likely to be what we see in the coming months,” Haines told the annual Reagan National Defence Forum in California.

The Ukrainian and Russian militaries will attempt to refit and resupply to prepare for counteroffensives after the winter, but there was a question as to whether the Kremlin could achieve that objective, she said.

“We actually have a fair amount of skepticism as to whether or not the Russians will be in fact prepared to do that. I think more optimistically for the Ukrainians in that timeframe,” she said.

Putin is beginning to realize the challenges his military is faced with, Haines said.

The Atlantic Council, a US think tank, said recently that winter conditions in Ukraine may favor Russian defensive tactics and allow the Russians to bring in newly-mobilized forces to positions held east of the Dnipro River and near Crimea in the south.

Agencies