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Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, January 6, 2024

Russian Mobilization and Force Generation Efforts (Russian objective: Expand combat power without conducting general mobilization)

The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) continues efforts to incentivize service with the Russian military by advertising support for housing. The Russian MoD announced on January 6 that it resolved issues of poor housing conditions for 56,000 military families and reimbursed over 100,000 individuals for rent.[38] The MoD stated that it provided military personnel over 73 billion rubles (roughly $802 million) of housing subsidies. The MoD stated that it provided over 5,000 military personnel with housing assistance in 2023, including providing 4,100 with subsidies and roughly 900 with permanent housing, and that over 18,000 military personnel enrolled in the Russian savings-mortgage system (NIS) housing support program.

full report: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-january-6-2024

This picture was not taken 100 years ago:

https://www.rferl.org/a/siberian-woman-photographing-forgotten-heartland/32452179.html

Following eggs, chicken began to disappear from stores. Who is guilty?

Paradoxical things are happening in the food market. Initially, prices for eggs in stores went up, essentially there was a threat of an artificial shortage, but the Ministry of Agriculture team led by Dmitry Patrushev [son of Nikolai] made considerable efforts to stabilize the situation. Negotiations were held with a number of countries and in the near future from 50 to 100 million eggs will enter the country. Including artificial ones, which, as the Ministry of Agriculture assures , do not pose a threat to the life and health of citizens. The egg shortage will be resolved soon. Patrushev Jr. held extremely productive negotiations with China.

However, against this background, another problem arose - chicken began to disappear from supermarket shelves. The reason for the development of panic was photographs from Chelyabinsk , where in many supermarkets the shelves were really empty.

The Ministry of Agriculture assures that there are no problems with supplies. Off the record, our interlocutors at the ministry say that for the second month now there has been an attempt to discredit Dmitry Patrushev . Representatives of some Kremlin towers are seriously afraid of his further political growth and are trying to create a problematic image for him. In general, they want to label an effective minister as a loser. They say they are even preparing an Internet campaign “Patrushev, where are the eggs?” At the same time, the Ministry of Agriculture team is indeed actively working to prevent shortages of both eggs and chicken meat.

“In November-December, part of the livestock died due to bird flu. We have intensified checks to protect our citizens. There will be no problems with the supply of chicken,” the ministry assured.

That is, in essence, the shortage of certain products was created artificially and is an attempt to bring down Dmitry Patrushev within the framework of internal political competition. Patrushev himself understands everything and prefers not to react to provocations, but to deal with state affairs.

https://t.me/kremlin_secrets/3399

If this is true, the target is not
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitry_Patrushev but his father

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_Patrushev

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, January 7, 2024

Two Russian government officials defended migrants’ continued presence in Russia amid ongoing migrant crackdowns, generating heavy milblogger criticism and indicating that the Russian government likely still lacks a unified policy toward migrants in Russia. Russian Presidential Commissioner for the Protection of Entrepreneurs’ Rights Boris Titov stated on January 7 that Russian fears that migrants are taking Russian jobs are “completely unfounded” and claimed that the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) statistics show that Russian citizens commit many more crimes than migrants.[17] Russian outlet Kommersant reported that foreign citizens committed two percent of the total number of crimes in Russia from January to November 2023 citing MVD statistics.[18] Russian milbloggers heavily criticized Titov’s statements, called him out of touch with ordinary Russian life, and accused him of wanting to replace the ethnic Russian population of Russia with migrants.[19] Another milblogger claimed that unspecified ”specific diasporas” control entire sectors of the Russian economy and claimed that many migrants who receive Russian citizenship commit crimes and therefore, are not reflected in the low statistic of crimes committed by foreigners in Russia.[20] Russian milbloggers also attacked the Nizhny Tagil (Sverdlovsk Oblast) Police Department Deputy Head Colonel Taras Bulgakov for claiming that people “made a big deal out of nothing” regarding a December 29 incident wherein two migrant teenagers beat a presumably ethnically Russian child in Nizhny Tagil.[21] Russian milbloggers claimed that Russian authorities should send Bulgakov to fight in Ukraine and claimed that migrants pose a counterintelligence threat since Russia‘s largest tank production factory, Uralvagonzavod, is in Nizhny Tagil.[22]

Titov’s statement attempting to dispel fears of migrants’ involvement in the Russian economy is likely part of an effort to build Russian public support for continued reliance on migrant labor to offset domestic labor shortages induced by Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Russia reportedly faced a domestic labor shortage of about 4.8 million people in 2023, likely including both skilled and unskilled labor.[23] ISW continues to assess that the Russian government is pursuing competing and incoherent efforts to coerce migrants into the Russian military, leverage them to offset Russian labor shortages caused by the war, and restrict them from working in Russia, in part, to appease the xenophobic pro-war Russian ultranationalist community. Titov’s statements defending migrants’ contributions to the Russian economy likely reflect the view of the parts of the Russian government that seek to sustain the Russian economy through migrant labor. Russian military and security elements - particularly the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD), MVD, Rosgvardia, Investigative Committee, and the Federal Security Service (FSB) — appear to be spearheading efforts to coerce migrants into the Russian military. These Russian government organs have consistently conducted raids on migrant communities to issue military summonses to naturalized migrants, recruited migrants from migrant detention facilities, offered Russian citizenship in exchange for military service, and advertised Russian military contract service in Central Asian languages.[24] The MVD has also submitted laws to the Russian government aimed at restricting migrant labor, likely to coerce them into military service.[25]

full report: https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-january-7-2024

Russian blogger:

The generals are trying to persuade Putin not to demobilize. The President agreed to only one concession.

Three of our sources in the Kremlin claim that over the past week Sergei Shoigu and more than ten other generals from the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff approached Vladimir Putin with a request not to announce partial demobilization. The military failed to convince Vladimir Vladimirovich. He insists on the demobilization of some of those who were mobilized in 2022, “at least 10-25 thousand people.” And he wants the first demobilized to return home no later than the end of February. And the bulk of those who will be released from the army should return in early March.

At the same time, Putin did make one concession to the military. He allowed them to develop the demobilization procedure and the entire set of measures necessary for its implementation not before January 12, as he previously demanded, but before the 20-25th. If the military does everything, demobilization may be officially announced no later than the beginning of February. If the military fails to cope with this task, there will be serious personnel consequences. “Vladimir Vladimirovich expects a lot from the military. Plans for demobilization, plans for the [invasion of Ukraine], forecasts about which cities we will take this year. I think everything will be fine. We are waiting for positive signals on all these issues,” one of our interlocutors in the Kremlin told us

https://t.me/kremlin_secrets/3406

Those who are demobilized will tell everyone they know about what is happening and try to avoid being mobilized again.