Ukrainian forces are operating in or near roughly 41 settlements in Kursk region as of August 13, although there are many extremely small settlements and localities within this area that ISW has not included in this count.

“Discrepancies between Ukrainian official reporting and ISW's observed claims and geolocated footage are not a refutation of Ukrainian official reporting but rather are a result of the inherent limitations of ISW's open-source methodology and commitment to using only publicly available information. ISW does not assess that Ukrainian forces control all of the territory within the maximalist extent of claimed Ukrainian advances according to the definition of ‘control’ that ISW uses,” the message reads.

At the same time, the ISW say that Russian forces have not completely stabilized the situation in Kursk Oblast despite ongoing efforts to stabilize the frontline and repel Ukrainian attacks.

“Geolocated footage published on August 12 and August 13 showing Ukrainian forces operating well within the maximalist claimed limit of Ukrainian advances indicates that Ukrainian forces continue operating closer to the international border in Kursk region and within Sudzha. Russian milbloggers claimed on August 13 that Russian forces continued to repel Ukrainian attempts to cross the Kolotilovka border checkpoint in Belgorod region (on the international border southeast of Sudzha and northwest of Belgorod City),” the review says.

According to ISW, Ukrainian forces advanced in the fields north of Snagost (south of Korenovo). Also, with reference to its own sources, ISW reports that Ukrainian forces continue attacking Koronevo and Tolpino (just north of Koronevo), seized Pogrebki (north of Sudzha and 17km from the international border), attempted to gain a foothold near Bolshoye Soldatskoye (northeast of Sudzha and 27km from the international border).

“The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and other Russian sources claimed that Russian forces repelled Ukrainian attacks near Obschy Kolodez (northeast of Korenevo and 30 kilometers from the international border) and Alekseevsky (northwest of Korenovo and 27km from the international border), and geolocated footage published on August 13 indicates that Ukrainian forces advanced northeast of Alekseevsky,” the message says.

The analysts note that the Russian military command may be pulling select elements of Russian irregular units from Donetsk region to address the Ukrainian incursion in Kursk region. “Such a redeployment could affect the tempo of Russian offensive operations in the Russian military's assessed priority sectors over time,” the review says.

It is reported that artillery elements of the Russian Northern Grouping of Forces were redeployed from northern Kharkiv region to Kursk region following previous Russian and Ukrainian reporting about such redeployments.

“Russian authorities appear to be largely relying on Russian conscripts, and elements of some regular and irregular military units pulled from less critical sectors of the frontline to address the ongoing Ukrainian incursion, however,” the ISW note.