Russia captured a strategically significant Ukrainian town, but the high price it paid to win Marinka may hamper the victory

• Russia captured a key Ukrainian town this week but may not have the resources to exploit the win.
• Months of brutal attritional fighting in Marinka has left the small town decimated.

Russia laid claim to Marinka, a key Ukrainian city this week after months of hammering the small eastern town — but the steep price it paid to capture the settlement may render Russia's victory short-lived.

On Monday, Russia announced the capture of Marinka, a town in the Donetsk region where fighting has been ongoing for months. Though Ukrainian officials initially denied Russia's claim, the country later confirmed that its forces had retreated to the outskirts of the town to establish new positions.

Russian President Vladimir Putin celebrated the capture of Marinka, saying it would allow the country's forces to move deeper into Ukraine.

But expert analysis in the aftermath of Marinka's fall has characterized Russia's win as strategically limited.

"The big story of Marinka is the cost at which it was captured, more than the utility of its capture," Simon Miles, an assistant professor at Duke University's Sanford School of Public Policy and a historian of the Soviet Union and US-Soviet relations, told Business Insider.

Miles added that he is "skeptical" Russia has sufficient combat power to exploit the victory.

While Marinka's eastern locale does offer Russia a strategic win, in theory — the town could serve as a gateway location to the bigger Ukrainian city of Donetsk — the country's ongoing tank troubles and depleted resources in the aftermath of the capture may hamper its ability to capitalize on the town's beneficial geography, Miles and other analysts said.

Since 2014, Russia has committed massive amounts of time and resources to capturing the tiny town of Marinka, which had a pre-invasion population of only about 9,000.

Russia conducted daily assaults on the town since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022, according to the Washington, DC-based Institute for the Study of War, and ramped up its brutal attacks on Marinka in October.

The brutal, attritional fighting has left Marinka a ghost town, almost entirely decimated. Both Russian and Ukrainian officials have acknowledged the level of destruction waged there.

"A flattened town is hardly the sort of strongpoint from which one would want to be projecting power," Miles said.

In recent days, the Institute for the Study of War characterized Russia's capture of Marinka as a "limited tactical win."

"A small and completely destroyed settlement does not offer Russian forces a secure operational foothold from which to launch further offensive operations," analysts for ISW wrote in a Tuesday update.

The think tank said Russia's win does not portend an opportunity for significant advance unless the country can "dramatically improve" its ability to conduct rapid forward movements with armored vehicles — something it has struggled with for months.

Russia has failed to pull off any offensive operation that led to rapid forward movement since the spring, according to ISW, and the assault on Marinka has left Russian forces with "severely degraded" capabilities.

Ukrainian forces, meanwhile, remain on the outskirts of Marinka, where they are preparing a defensive line around the settlement, according to the Tuesday ISW update.

"The Ukrainians have pulled back but are still right in the vicinity and will do what they can to hamper any Russian offensives emanating from that area," Miles said.

And though Russia continued to consolidate its power in the area on Wednesday, according to ISW, the country's tank problems persist.

"They took Marinka through brutal, drawn-out, attritional fighting basically since this war began in order to advance barely a kilometer to take the town," Miles said. "That's a staggering cost for which the Russians will continue to pay."