Russia probably can't capitalize on a recent victory because it's so bad at using its armored vehicles, experts say

• Russia appears to have captured the Ukrainian town of Marinka, in a win celebrated by Putin.
• But the ISW group of experts said its capture is unlikely to give Russia a strategic advantage.

Russia's likely capture of a town in eastern Ukraine won't give it any big strategic boost unless it can sort out its inability to fight with armored vehicles without sustaining huge losses, a group of experts said.

The Washington DC-based Institute for the Study of War said in an update on Wednesday that "Russia's likely capture of Marinka in Donetsk Oblast represents a limited Russian tactical gain."

It added that it doesn't suggest any operationally significant advance "unless Russian forces have dramatically improved their ability to conduct rapid mechanized forward movement, which they show no signs of having done."

Russia on Monday said it had taken control of Marinka, an eastern Ukrainian town where fighting has raged for months. Ukraine said the following day that its forces had retreated to the town's outskirts to set up new positions.

The ISW said that Russian forces "likely control most if not all of Marinka," despite no visual confirmation as of Tuesday that Russia had fully captured the town.

Marinka could be strategic, as its location offers a gateway into the Ukrainian city of Donetsk.

Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed the win there would allow his forces to push further into Ukraine.

But the ISW said Russia's progress in Marinka is unlikely to give it a big strategic boost, unless it can improve its mechanized warfare.

Russia, the ISW said, has not been able to conduct any "offensive operation that resulted in a rapid and mechanized forward advance since Spring 2022."

And, in fact, its capabilities for this are "severely degraded," it said.

Previous Russian mechanized assaults have resulted in huge vehicle losses, like in the nearby town of Avdiivka, where losses "prompted the Russian command to transition to infantry-heavy ground attacks," the ISW said.

The ISW has been vocal about what it says is Russia's failure to conduct successful offensives with vehicles.

Riley Bailey, a Russia analyst with the ISW, told Business Insider earlier this month that Russia was repeatedly making the same mistakes using armored vehicles, resulting in big losses again and again.

Russia recently pivoted to more infantry-based tactics, showing it is sacrificing men to preserve vehicle power, Bailey said.

But this new tactic will make it hard for Russia to progress further than Marinka, the ISW said.

Another reason, it said, is that Ukraine has previously fortified many of the settlements that surround Marinka.

In the almost two years since the full-scale invasion began, Russian forces have advanced less than two miles into Marinka and there are no signs Russia will be faster to take other settlements, the ISW said.

Russia's likely takeover of Marinka is the result of "several months of highly attritional marginal gains," rather than the result of any sudden rapid mechanized Russian advance, it said.

Marinka has also been almost completely destroyed in the fighting.

Ukraine's Commander-in-Chief, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, said the damage was such that it "no longer exists." He said that Russia destroyed it "street by street and house by house."

Ukraine's retreat from Marinka was designed to protect the lives of his soldiers, Zaluzhnyi said, describing it as "nothing that can cause a public outcry."