President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is convinced that after the State Duma elections, Russia will announce a new wave of mobilisation. It is likely not to affect major cities.
However, Moscow is unlikely to be able to conceal the process, he said at a meeting with journalists on 22 August, LB’s correspondent reports. The enemy plans to mobilise a further 300,000 occupiers this year.
“We believe it will not be in the central cities. But I don’t think they will be able to hide it very effectively. They are planning what would be a peripheral mobilisation. Their desire today is an additional 300,000 for 2026, plus more for 2027. The target was half a million; now their strategy for 2026 is an additional 300,000 people to the front,” the head of state said.
He added that Russia’s main immediate objectives on the front remain towns in Donetsk Region—Kostiantynivka and Sloviansk.
“The latest deadline he gave his generals is to finish the occupation of Donetsk and Luhansk regions by the end of the year. That is impossible. That is our answer,” the president said.
In the fighting for Ukrainian towns in Donetsk Region, the enemy is suffering heavy losses.
“As for Sloviansk: it is absolutely clear that these are their main positions today. Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Kostiantynivka are not under occupation. They have huge losses—simply terrifying figures. Seventy to eighty per cent of all their losses fall on this axis, on Kostiantynivka,” he said.
Commander-in-Chief Mykhailo Drapatyi has tasked forces with strengthening the Kramatorsk and Sloviansk directions.
He believes the 300,000 newly mobilised will be allocated depending on the situation in eastern Ukraine. If Russia has success there, the new occupiers will be redeployed to another direction—for example, for a so-called buffer zone or towards Chernihiv and Kyiv regions. According to Zelenskyy, Putin has theoretical intentions to launch an offensive in this direction from Bryansk Region. For now there is no manpower in Bryansk Region, but a build-up of equipment along Russia’s borders is visible.
“They will lose all these new 300,000 mobilised Russians there—we will destroy them, Putin will lose them all, because most will be thrown precisely there. With the ‘buffer zone’ they have nowhere to gain a foothold—different conditions, meaning there simply won’t be that mass pressure of manpower there. And this direction in Donetsk Region is the goal he has set himself, and he lives by this mad goal. That is why any talks for the ‘Russians’ begin with the signal that ‘let the Ukrainians leave the east of their own state’. They keep shifting the deadlines. Now their deadline is already set for the end of 2026. Earlier they wanted it before the US elections in the autumn of this year, and they even sent such a signal to the Americans, then once again he had to postpone that deadline,” the President of Ukraine said.
The president stressed that, as in previous years, Russia will strike Kyiv’s energy infrastructure in winter.
“We will fight in different ways. From the very beginning of the war, one of Putin’s main targets has been Kyiv. And it is absolutely clear how they will try to act against Kyiv’s energy sector. Across the country, our relevant authorities are trying to implement the Resilience Plans. Not everything has been done, and they must work faster. I very much hope that in the coming months we will speed up some processes that have slowed somewhat in communities. We are working on this. It concerns the whole country,” he said.