By Nataliya Bugayova and Frederick W. Kagan with Kateryna Stepanenko 



By Riley Bailey and Frederick W. Kagan with Nicole Wolkov and Christina Harward

 

This fact sheet delineates the distinctions between claims and verifiable facts regarding United States military assistance to Ukraine.

 

By Frederick W. Kagan, Kateryna Stepanenko, Mitchell Belcher, Noel Mikkelsen, and Thomas Bergeron

Latest from ISW

Africa File, March 28, 2024: Islamic State Resurgent in Mozambique; al Shabaab’s Ramadan Offensive

ISMP is massing forces, temporarily holding and governing territory, and operating across a geographic scope unseen since at least 2022. ISMP began increasing its rate of attacks in December 2023 and maintained a higher rate in January and February 2024 as part of the Islamic State’s global “Kill Them Where You Find Them” attack campaign. The Armed Conflict Location and Event Database (ACLED) recorded that ISMP has initiated 57 attacks since December 19, 2023. This rate is more than double the roughly nine attacks per month it averaged from January to November 2023. The group carried out six attacks in the first half of March, putting it on pace to surpass its monthly average in 2023 despite its offensive peaking in February. The group has sustained this increased activity despite Mozambique’s annual rainy season from January to March, when adverse weather conditions have historically caused attacks to decrease.

China-Taiwan Weekly Update, March 28, 2024

The United States, United Kingdom, and New Zealand accused PRC-state-sponsored cyber threat actors of conducting malicious cyber operations against democratic institutions. The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Department of Justice (DOJ) charged seven PRC nationals with cybercrimes on March 25. The cybercrimes were espionage and transnational repression in a far-reaching campaign that the PRC’s Ministry of State Security (MSS) directed. The indictment accused the MSS-backed group, referred to as Advanced Persistent Threat 31 (APT 31), of malicious cyber activities focused on infiltrating government networks globally to collect sensitive data from public officials who criticized the PRC.

Denying Russia’s Only Strategy for Success

The notion that the war is unwinnable because of Russia’s dominance is a Russian information operation, which gives us a glimpse of the Kremlin’s real strategy and only real hope of success. The Kremlin must get the United States to the sidelines, allowing Russia to fight Ukraine in isolation and then proceed to Moscow’s next targets, which Russia will also seek to isolate. The Kremlin needs the United States to choose inaction and embrace the false inevitability that Russia will prevail in Ukraine. Vladimir Putin’s center of gravity is his ability to shape the will and decisions of the West, Ukraine, and Russia itself.

Iran Update, March 27, 2024

Israeli forces continued operating in and around al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City on March 27. Israeli forces killed dozens of Palestinian fighters and located unspecified military infrastructure and weapons in the hospital area. Israeli Army Radio reported that the IDF surrounded three buildings in the hospital compound, where approximately 30 senior Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) personnel are located. The IDF published footage on March 26 of its forces questioning a PIJ fighter, who said that Hamas and PIJ personnel are “scattered in the buildings” at al Shifa Hospital. The IDF published an infographic of three Hamas and PIJ officials detained at the hospital, including a leader in Hamas’ Security and Protection Department.

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, March 27, 2024

The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine (HRMMU) released its 38th report on the human rights situation in Ukraine on March 26, confirming several of ISW’s longstanding assessments about Russia’s systematic violations of international human rights and humanitarian law in occupied territories and towards Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs). The HRMMU report details activities between December 1, 2023 and February 29 2024, and includes new findings about Russia’s abuse of Ukrainian POWs during this timeframe, based on interviews with 60 recently released male POWs. Nearly all of the POWs that HRMMU interviewed detailed how they were tortured by Russian forces with beatings and electric shocks and threatened with execution, and over half of the interviewees experienced sexual violence.

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, March 26, 2024

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said that the Crocus City Hall attackers originally fled toward Belarus not Ukraine, directly undermining the Kremlin narrative on Ukraine’s involvement, possibly to head off questions about why the attackers headed toward Belarus in the first place. During a visit to Belarus’ northwestern Ashmyany raion on March 26, Lukashenko reported that the Crocus City Hall attackers may have been planning to escape Russia’s Bryansk Oblast to Belarus, but that Belarus introduced a heightened security regime that forced the attackers to change course towards the Russia-Ukraine border. Lukashenko stated that the attackers “couldn’t enter Belarus” and praised high levels of cooperation between Russian and Belarusian special services for leading to the attackers’ arrests.